.
- In the criminal justice system,
sexually based offenses
are considered especially heinous.
In New York City, the dedicated detectives
who investigate these vicious felonies
are members of an elite squad
known as the Special Victims Unit.
These are their stories.
- [laughing]
[thudding, shattering]
[tense music]
- Hey!
What the hell? That's my car!
- Hey, don't come any closer!
- Look what you did! - He said stand back!
- Wha--[grunts]
[siren wailing] - Run, Harrison!
[tires screech]
[bat clatters]
- Police!
- NYPD!
- Don't move.
Put your hands on the car!
- Let's go. - Margot--
- Quiet!
- Are you all right? Do you need an ambulance?
- No, I'm--I'm okay.
- What happened?
- Uh, I just ca--came out and found them messing up m--
my car. - Any idea why?
- I mean,
I guess that.
♪ ♪
- I take it you're Zac.
- I just think it's important to believe victims.
- Well, I couldn't agree more.
But are you saying that you're a victim?
- I'm saying when people speak up, nobody listens.
- I'm listening.
Margot, I'm all ears. - [scoffs]
No, you're gonna say what everyone else says.
What was she wearing? Was she drinking?
- Okay, Margot, please.
Just yes or no.
Were you a victim of sexual assault?
- You see?
You're not listening.
- Look, this all got out of hand.
Nobody intended for anybody to get hurt.
- Yeah, kind of hard to buy that when you show up
with a baseball bat, Harrison.
- Margot said it was just a precaution.
- What else did Margot say?
- That it's important to take a stand.
And it is.
And that we should believe women, and I do.
- You always do what Margot tells you?
- She's very, very smart.
And she cares about the world,
and justice.
And--and she's-- and she's smart.
- And she told you that Zac was a rapist?
- I am not a rapist.
I don't even know what they're talking about.
- You've never met either of them?
- No, but a couple days ago, I started getting
all these DMs on my socials.
They found my work email.
Total strangers saying I raped somebody.
- Zac, what I need you to focus on
is why they'd get this idea about you.
- Man, I don't know.
[stammering] They're crazy?
You know, mistaken identity?
I--I don't even know who's saying I did that.
- Margot, this is not a trick question.
It's yes or no.
Is the victim a friend of yours or not?
- What if she's not?
Do we have to be besties?
- Oh, my God, you--
you don't have to be anything.
I don't know how to get through to you.
I cannot move forward with this investigation
until I have a name.
- Who is this victim you are avenging?
- Like, a name?
- Yeah, exactly, like a name.
- I don't actually know her real-life name.
- I never met her.
- You never had one conversation with her?
- No, but it doesn't matter.
What matters is we found her rapist, and you didn't.
- Okay, Margot, I need you to give me
something to investigate, just one thing.
Could be anything.
I need you to give me one thing.
♪ ♪
Her name is Jaded Ember.
She's a VTuber on Twitch.
Like a virtual streamer.
- I don't expect anyone to believe me or help me.
I just wanted to say it out loud.
The guy who raped me, he's gonna get away with it.
But maybe someone who's going through something like this,
maybe they'll hear me and have a different ending.
I don't know.
It would be awesome if this helped someone.
Otherwise, what's even the point?
- I mean, you'd have to be crazy to ignore that.
How could we just not try to help?
♪ ♪
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
.
- And we think he's casing the houses
until the occupants leave.
So I'm assigning an additional unit to Sector David.
Questions?
All right, then let's focus on quality stops and good collars.
And make sure your body cams are up and running.
Be professional, respectful, and everyone
comes back in one piece.
All right, thanks. Dismissed.
- Not one officer checking their phone.
They must like you.
- Well, there may or may not be a rumor going around
that anyone not paying attention to the roll
gets zero OT.
- You're laying down the hammer.
- Guess I'm a natural.
- I don't like this.
- There's nothing to like. It is what it is.
- Yeah, but can I still be mad for you?
- Ah, shoot, I got a budgeting meeting coming up.
But tell Griff if he double parks in front of the precinct
again, I'm gonna have his ass towed.
- I'm not gonna lie.
That interview from last night kind of broke my brain.
- Yeah, I feel like I know less after talking to them
than I did after reading the two-sentence police report.
- I had to cut Zac loose. He said he'd stay in town.
- Yeah, we got nothing to hold him on.
- What'd I miss?
- A whole lot of questions.
- Okay, so I found the rest of that clip
from Jaded Ember's Twitch site.
She's got a ton of fans on GameCast.
Mostly livestreams herself playing video games.
But here's the part of the video where
she talks about being raped.
- I was in therapy when it all came back to me.
It's so crazy how your brain can just forget things
that are, like, too traumatic.
But I can feel him
pressing down on my neck,
telling me to relax.
I could hardly breathe.
I couldn't scream.
I-- [breathes shakily]
I don't know. This sounds crazy.
I hope you guys believe me.
- So it's a recovered memory.
- Yeah, from someone who won't reveal their identity.
It's tricky.
- Did she identify her rapist?
- No, nothing. No name, no details.
- But our vigilante Margot claims that
her detective skills are so incredible that
they have cracked the case. - Mm.
- Well, Zac is also a gamer.
He's got a big following on Twitch.
He and Jaded Ember were dating.
But Zac claims they never met, only online.
They had a big public ugly breakup about a year ago.
Her fans just jumped to their own conclusions.
- It seems real thin.
- Well, how many of her fans think that he's a rapist?
- Oh, most of them.
- So he could be looking at more of her fans
tracking him down and harassing him, or worse.
- So let's get a subpoena for her identity.
That way, if she makes a complaint,
we have something to investigate.
April Deieso?
- Uh, yeah?
- You're Jaded Ember.
- What's this about?
- We're from Special Victims Unit.
Can we talk to you for a sec?
- I don't recognize them.
Yeah, I know Zac.
He's a dick and a terrible boyfriend,
but he didn't rape me.
- Well, thanks for clearing that up.
- How bad was it? Is he okay?
- He was shaken up, but he's fine.
You made some pretty serious allegations
on that live stream.
We are sorry that that happened to you,
and we would like to investigate.
- No.
I know that it sounds kind of weird,
that I'm saying I was raped, but I don't really remember.
And I--I know how crazy that sounds--
- But it's not crazy.
So, April, it's very common for victims
to block out significant details from their assault.
- Right, but I only remember bits and pieces,
and I don't wanna be, like, quizzed on everything.
- You said you remembered this while you were in therapy.
Can you talk to us more about that?
- I--I don't think I can.
- What do you mean?
- I was on a psychedelic.
- Okay.
- It was a clinical trial for PTSD.
It's this drug called protryptamine.
- Okay.
- No, I--
I really shouldn't have said anything.
I know how it sounds.
Nobody's gonna believe me.
- We're here because we think that
there is something to investigate.
- There's not.
I don't remember enough.
You won't be able to find him.
- Let us try.
[suspenseful music]
So the clinical trial has been over for almost a year.
And the drug is being tested for the treatment
of PTSD, anxiety, depression.
- And April had no memory of this assault
before taking a hallucinogen?
- No, she doesn't.
But it's--it's not a hallucinogen.
It's not like LSD or DMT.
It activates serotonin receptors,
increases prolactin, which boosts
about every happy hormone you can think of.
- And this makes you recover memories?
Or invent them?
Look, I gotta ask you,
are you sure that this assault actually happened?
- Well, we don't know yet, but April believes that it did.
And now so do a lot of internet warriors.
So we're just--we're trying to get to the truth.
- All right, look, even if April recalls details,
you're gonna need a lot more than that.
The issue here--she wasn't aware this crime happened
before taking a psychedelic.
- Even if this treatment is gaining legitimacy?
- Well, it doesn't matter.
People v. Hughes, People v. Tunstall,
both of these cases evaluated memories
that were recovered through hypnosis,
and the courts have repeatedly found
that testimony needs to be supported
by pre-hypnotic recollection, okay?
They're absolutely going to apply that here.
- So this is dead in the water?
- You can use this statement to ID a suspect,
but then you're gonna need independent evidence.
You're gonna need a confession.
- Well, you know, it's a clinical trial.
They've gotta have records.
So maybe there's more details in the session.
- Those are not gonna be admissible.
- But it's a very good place to start.
I'll see if I can get permission from April
to talk with the therapist.
- Protryptamine is both plant-derived
and chemically stabilized, making it more compatible
with our brain chemistry than most psychedelics.
And the vast majority of our participants,
they no longer meet the diagnostic criteria for PTSD.
I won't be going back to traditional treatment again.
- So it's a miracle drug?
- I know it all sounds a little kooky--
pop a pill, listen to music, lay down in a dark room,
and see what feelings come up,
but we have seen what it could do for people.
- Which one of you treated April?
- We both did.
- At the--at the same time?
Is that typical?
- It's protocol, and necessary.
I mean, the sessions can bring up strong, sometimes difficult
emotions, and can last hours.
- What were you treating her for?
- PTSD.
At the time, we believed her symptoms--hyperarousal,
numbness, hypervigilance--
all stemmed from growing up in an unstable household
with an alcoholic mother.
- You think it's possible it actually
stemmed from sexual assault?
- Obviously, we don't know for certain.
But whether or not an event happened is unimportant.
- Seems it would be very important.
- Detectives, we're not in the business
of investigating the accuracy of a memory
or catching criminals.
We are in the business of healing.
We explore the meaning behind the memory, true or not.
- Yes or no.
You think she was raped?
- No, I don't.
[suspenseful music]
I pulled her session files.
Take a look yourselves.
I trust that you'll protect both April and our work.
- Thank you.
♪ ♪
- Dr. Severson, got a minute?
- Uh, unfortunately, no.
I'm late for an appointment. Sorry.
- We'll walk with you, and then maybe you
could tell us what you wouldn't say up there
in front of your partner.
- Uh, there's really not much more to say.
- That's fine.
We'll just ask more questions, widen the net,
involve a lot more people.
You know, that won't impact the clinical trials at all.
- Nah, 'cause you know what pharmaceutical
companies really love?
Police investigations.
- Look, I'll start by saying,
I don't mean to disparage my colleague.
I have a lot of respect for Dr. Catmull.
He's worked in psychedelics a long time,
which may be the reason he's a little too invested
in pushing protryptamine over the finish line.
- And if it gets stalled, all that research money
goes down the drain.
- It's not about the money.
It's about helping people.
Jonah wasn't wrong to question recovered memories
in any setting.
Sometimes they're metaphors.
But he didn't give you the whole truth.
April has a history of using psychedelics--
about five years ago.
It wasn't revealed in the initial interview.
It came out in therapy.
But that should have disqualified her
from the study.
- Why didn't it?
- Because she's a success story.
Jonah wanted it in.
- So what does that have to do with her memory
of being assaulted?
- Jonah omitted the time period when April was using,
when she was meeting a lot of men
and blacking out on a regular basis.
- You think that's when this happened?
- I can't say for sure it was rape,
but something happened to that girl.
♪ ♪
.
- April was trying to put together a list of the men
that she dated five years ago,
but her memory's spotty.
- Can you remember who you dated five years ago?
- Well, we are not talking about me, thank you very much.
What do we got?
- Combing through dating app matches and cross-checking
names with databases.
- Liv.
- "No psychedelic is a magic bullet."
- For this writer.
For others, it's the new frontier
for mental health medicine.
Some studies say psychedelics can assist in memory recall,
but others say that it impairs it.
I had a psych professor at Fordham
who had a section on how psychedelics affect the brain.
She can break it down for me.
- Good. Go talk to her.
- So how does protryptamine make you remember things?
- It's more that it modulates the brain's fear response.
Our brain protects us from traumatic memories.
And a psychedelic like protryptamine
can allow you to recall those events
with less shame and judgment.
For me, psychedelics weren't so much about memory.
I just felt very connected and present.
- You've done psychedelics?
- I might have had a crisis of faith or two
that required some highly classified trips
to Oaxaca a few years back. - [laughs] Ah.
- You're not gonna turn me in, are you?
- Yeah, the DA's on its way.
- It wasn't a clinical trial, of course.
She was a lovely woman, luckily.
You're very vulnerable in that state.
I'm glad to see the practice is becoming more regulated now.
- There have been problems?
- It's not just protryptamine.
Sex abuse is a known problem in psychedelics,
even the naturally occurring ones
like ayahuasca or psilocybin.
- Mm.
- All those happy hormones,
they mess with your personal boundaries.
They trick you into thinking you're okay with things
when you're not.
- Which is why there's two therapists--
make sure nobody crosses a line.
- The first time, I was totally freaked out.
- Okay.
- I didn't sleep at all the night before.
And I got there, I took the pill,
and, like, immediately fell asleep.
- Oh.
- When I woke up, I felt...
like I...
understood what love meant.
- Wow. - [laughs]
Not--not, like, being in love, but just how
everything and everyone is all one.
It's--it's hard to describe.
I--I know I probably sound nuts.
- No, it sounds kind of, um, incredible.
So when did you remember the assault?
- The third time.
- Okay.
- They had me put an eye mask on,
and it makes things a lot more intense.
It felt so vivid,
this strong feeling of...
violation.
I could actually feel it happening in my body.
I was crying.
- Did you tell your therapists?
- One of them was sitting with me.
He was rubbing my back and my legs, holding me.
- Is that a common practice for your sessions,
the physical touch?
- Y--yeah, I guess so. - Okay.
It's just that's-- that's quite unorthodox,
for a therapist to-- to cross that boundary.
What happened afterwards?
- I went home.
- Mm-hmm.
- And I could still feel it in my body the next day--
soreness between my legs
and my throat,
like somebody had choked me.
They said it wasn't unusual for the brain to convince the body
that it had really happened.
- In my experience, the opposite is true.
Um...
it's the body
that doesn't lie.
And your body was telling you
that you had been violated.
[suspenseful music]
And I think that you were.
But not five years ago.
Have you considered that maybe you were assaulted during--
during your session?
♪ ♪
- No.
♪ ♪
For a long time, I felt really good about the therapy.
It changed my brain.
It made me more open and optimistic.
And now it just feels like it got rotten.
Like I'm too sick to be fixed.
- That's not true.
You're not too sick to be fixed.
They took advantage of you when you were vulnerable.
And now they're gonna pay.
♪ ♪
.
- Okay, so if the sessions always had two therapists,
what are we thinking? Both of them did it?
One of them did it while the other watched?
- Or they weren't always together all the time.
- April doesn't know who was there
because she had a mask over her eyes.
- Well, we both know for a fact
they're willing to lie to cover it up.
Catmull fudged the session notes.
Severson sent us on a wild goose chase
looking at five-year-old Hinge matches.
Catmull has an M.D. and a PhD.
He's been big in the psychedelics community
since the '90s.
He's a real cheerleader for its benefits.
He's got no complaints against him.
He did a ton of research papers on protryptamine therapy.
And I looked into Catmull's financials.
He's got significant investments in all of this.
Okay, if protryptamine gets distribution,
he will make a lot of money.
- Hmm.
- Severson's a PsyD.
He's new to psychedelics game.
He still has a private practice.
He specializes in complex trauma, PTSD, EMDR.
No complaints against him either.
- He and Catmull started working together two years ago
for Serolyte Pharmaceuticals.
The parent company is based in Japan.
The U.S. division developed protryptamine
and is running the trials.
- Okay, well, these clinical trials
often record their testing.
So I mean, maybe there's video of these sessions.
Let's see.
- Who's Judd Flannery?
- Catmull wrote all of his papers with the guy.
And then it looks like they stopped
around the time Severson came into the picture.
- I wonder what split 'em up.
- Yeah, let's find out.
- Dr. Catmull and Dr. Severson
are some of our finest researchers.
Jonah has been with it from almost the beginning.
- Uh-huh. - Since they paired up,
their sites consistently report
the best patient scores.
Why?
- Well, have you ever had any complaints
about either of them?
- No.
What kind of complaints?
- April Deieso recovered a memory
of being sexually assaulted during one of her sessions.
We are looking into the possibility
that she was assaulted during that session.
- That's not possible. April?
Are you sure? - Yeah.
- She was so pleased with her treatment outcome.
- So are these sessions recorded, Ms. Fuentes?
- Yes.
But given how sensitive the content is,
I can't turn anything over without a patient's permission.
- Well, I can help you with that.
This is April's consent.
And you should have a digital copy of that in your inbox.
- I can't give you anything without a subpoena.
- All right, we will get a subpoena.
We'll be back.
- Save the world,
as long as you have a court order.
- Either of you guys ever take that online quiz
where you put in how many times a year you visit your parents,
and then it tells you how much time you got
left with them before they die?
- Hard no.
- I used to calculate how much closer I was to death
working at a job I didn't care about,
so one day I just walked.
- All those years in medical school to work in a bike shop?
My dad would have throttled me.
- Well, never been happier.
Don't get me wrong, I love helping people.
I just hated everything else.
- Including Catmull?
- You know, I thought I was so lucky when he
asked me to be his research partner.
It didn't take long to realize he didn't
care much about the science.
Has he been arrested?
- Why do you ask?
- Dude's a druggie.
I caught him swiping pills from our inventory.
And I reported him to my supervisor at Serolyte,
and she said they'd handle it internally.
- But they never did. - I don't know.
But there's definitely this mentality over there
that nothing can stop the momentum, you know?
- You ever see him act inappropriate with a patient?
- You mean, like, sexually?
No, but I wouldn't put anything past that guy.
A shrink with no empathy?
That's wild.
One time I asked him why he got into psychedelics.
You know what he said? - Huh?
- "It's where the money's at."
- Judd Flannery was a fresh graduate who
was incompetent and incapable.
That's why I ended the relationship.
Look, for all I know, he stole the meds.
- You think we're on the hunt for some pills
that went missing two years ago?
We're way beyond that now, Jonah.
- Nah, this is about what you did to April.
- [scoffs] What are you talking about?
- Get her vulnerable and compliant,
assault her, and convince her it was a hallucination.
- What are you saying, that I-- - That you raped your client?
Yeah, that's what we're saying. - Absolutely not.
- The only question is, was it a tag-team situation
with you and your partner? Or was it all his idea?
- I leave the session sometimes.
I know I'm not supposed to.
Austin--
Austin encouraged me to take breaks.
- Sure, sure, sure, sure.
It's always the other guy, isn't it?
- I can prove it.
I have videos, everything we sent to Serolyte.
I've got copies.
- Have you watched them?
Because you had a feeling you knew what was on them,
didn't you?
[tense music]
[April crying]
- Let it go. - No.
- Just relax. - No, don't touch me.
- Shh. - No, no, no.
I don't want...
[crying]
- April, you need this.
- No.
Please don't.
I--I can't breathe.
I can't breathe. No.
Please, no, I don't want it!
Please, stop!
- Can you open your thighs for me?
- No. Stop!
- Okay, that's enough.
- There might not be enough there to prove rape,
but we absolutely have him on sexual assault.
We're still going through all the videos,
but Liv, we've already found two other women
Severson did this to.
- Get him.
- Three crisis calls this morning, all before 10:00 a.m.?
I think I deserve this. - Dr. Severson.
- Whoa. - Detectives,
this isn't the best time.
- Is it ever? Get up!
- What on Earth are you doing?
- Arresting you, Doc. - What?
- Here, enjoy that.
- You have the right to remain silent.
Anything you say can and will be used against you.
.
- So I'm gonna start with the obvious question,
which is, did you forget that you were being recorded?
Or--or did you just not care?
- [chuckles]
Captain, I can see how this might seem strange
if you're not versed in this therapy.
- Mm-hmm.
- But that's what this therapy looks like.
- You assaulted her.
- I comforted her.
A person who's taken protryptamine
needs reassurance.
They need someone there to hold them together,
both mentally and physically.
- I have to stop you for a second
because you can't just sit there
and pretend that we didn't see clearly what is on this video.
- You don't have the context.
Are my methods unorthodox?
Absolutely.
But the use of touch, so long as it's non-sexual,
has been very effective.
- You call that there non-sexual?
Yeah?
Do you know what that word means?
- Nothing that has transpired between my clients and myself
has ever been sexual.
- Mm-hmm. - Well, not for me.
I don't derive any benefit or pleasure from these sessions.
- Yeah, well, neither was she. She was in tears!
She said "no," "stop," multiple times!
- And if I told a surgeon, "no, don't sew up that incision
you just made," would he stop?
- I think I get it.
So what you're saying is that sometimes when
a person is feeling vulnerable, right,
they just--they just wanna be held.
- Exactly.
The level of this therapy is so intense,
you have to experience it to understand.
I think someone like you would benefit from it, Captain.
[tense music]
- Well, that is, uh, so kind of you to think of me.
Um,
where was Dr. Catmull during all of this?
- Uh, I don't recall exactly. He may have been on a break.
- The other two patients that got your special,
uh, hands-on care, where was Dr. Catmull for those?
- I would have to check the videos.
- He wasn't there.
Every single time.
Honestly, you're real smart, Doctor.
You're smarter than me.
You're smarter than most people who sit in that chair.
I mean,
creating your own hunting ground
and then hiding behind a clinical trial,
and then having your victims sign up for it themselves.
That is, uh-- that is brilliant.
- Regular genius.
- But you're no different
than every other predator.
You know that.
And now everyone else will, too,
because we have it all on video.
♪ ♪
- Captain Curry.
Executive Officer. Look at you, rising the ranks.
- Thanks, Chief. - Here for CompStat?
- Yeah, my first one.
- Better not be late.
- Hey, I'll catch up with you.
Griff.
- Hey, Captain.
Wow, you're all dressed up.
- Yeah, well, CompStat meeting,
so I had to drag this thing out.
Little, uh, field trip to the records room?
- Uh, yeah.
Yeah, Cap asked me to pull some old case files.
Thinks we might have a repeat offender.
- Hmm.
I didn't hear anything about that.
- Yeah.
Well, hey, we miss you up there.
I gotta go.
- Hey, I just arraigned Severson, and--
you're not gonna believe this,
but he pled to the entire indictment.
- You're kidding.
- The judge gave him 15 years.
- For three rapes? [scoffs]
- Look, Amanda, I'm not upset about this,
and you shouldn't be either.
This case in no way was gonna be a slam dunk.
The video was inconclusive.
Even if April and the other two victims were ready to testify,
they were in an experimental treatment program.
That was always gonna be tricky with the jury.
To be honest, I'm surprised this lawyer
didn't wanna go to trial.
- Oh, my God, he's protecting his study.
- From what? - Scrutiny.
Look, Severson is a creep.
He's a predator.
But he is a true believer in his therapy.
- He'll take the hit so his company doesn't.
- And Serolyte had all the videos of Severson.
They knew what he was doing.
And they did nothing?
- And it's despicable, but unfortunately,
they don't have a duty to report--
- So they get off on a technicality?
Come on.
[suspenseful music]
- Don't--don't look at me like that, all right?
For once, I'd like to be able to stay within my jurisdiction
when it comes to you, Liv.
♪ ♪
[scoffs]
We can't charge Serolyte criminally.
But we can try to shut 'em down.
♪ ♪
- Sonny, gotta say, shutting down
an entire corporation because of one bad apple
doesn't sit well with me.
Serolyte seems to be getting some good results
out of this drug.
- Well, I have no issue with protryptamine,
psychedelics in general, when they're handled appropriately.
But what I do have an issue with is poor oversight
and not paying attention when a doctor assaults his patients.
- And that man is going to prison.
- But that does nothing to solve the underlying issue.
Look, their complete lack of oversight
has created the perfect conditions
for this to happen again with another doctor.
- I'm not saying we don't take a look.
But shutting down the company could
shut down the entire pursuit of this treatment.
- But if you do nothing, then patients
are gonna stay vulnerable.
Look, listen, how about this?
Cross-designate me.
Let me take it on.
- [sighs]
♪ ♪
.
- She said both doctors would be in the room at all times,
for my protection and theirs.
- And did Ms. Fuentes have you sign
a consent form for your sessions to be recorded?
- I did.
They said it was for the study, and no one else would see them.
- And I'm assuming that you did not consent
to either doctor lying under a blanket with you
and touching your body.
- No, absolutely not.
- And did Ms. Fuentes or anyone else
from Serolyte Pharmaceuticals ever reach out to you
about what was on your recorded video sessions?
- No.
- Even after Dr. Severson was arrested
for sexually assaulting you?
- Not a word.
- Thank you, Ms. Deieso.
No further questions, Your Honor.
- Ms. Rettstadt, your witness.
- Ms. Deieso,
what you endured at the hands of Dr. Severson
was reprehensible.
And I don't wanna put you through a long list
of questions, so I'll be quick, all right?
- Okay.
- I really just have one.
Did this therapy help you?
- I don't know how--
I was assaulted.
Raped.
- I know.
But that's not what I'm asking.
You had been treated for PTSD.
Is that still your diagnosis?
- He's a monster. - I don't disagree.
He is.
And according to your post-clinical trial follow-up,
your PTSD is, medically speaking, no longer present.
So I'll ask again.
Did it help you?
[tense music]
♪ ♪
- When I wake up at night, I feel like I'm being choked.
I feel hands on me.
Feel him on top of me over a year later.
I think about what would have happened
if Dr. Severson hadn't done this to me,
what that life would have been like.
I'll never know.
I just don't want what happened to me to happen to anyone else.
♪ ♪
- Ms. Fuentes, your company has safeguards in place
to prevent sexual abuse, correct?
- Yes, we do.
- For example, you require two therapists
to be present for the entire duration of every session.
- Correct.
- And you also require that each session
be recorded on video.
- Yes.
- But that didn't really stop Dr. Severson, though, did it?
- We were horrified by his criminal actions.
But to say that one bad actor is indicative
of our entire company is false.
- Right, because you know for certain that
there was only one bad actor.
You got the videos, right?
So if anything inappropriate had happened,
well, you would have seen that.
You do record every session, don't you, Dr. Fuentes?
- Yes.
- And have you ever seen a therapist
leave a session when they weren't supposed to?
- I never saw that.
- No? In all those videos?
That's astonishing.
I mean, how many hours would you say there are?
There's gotta be thousands. - Yes.
- And approximately how many hours of those sessions
did you watch?
- I haven't had an opportunity to review.
- You never watch the videos
that you require for the purpose
of protecting your patients?
- Me, personally? No.
- Okay, not personally, but who does?
- You have to understand.
We keep the videos as records.
We simply don't have the manpower
to review that much footage.
We're a research-focused entity.
- Whose primary purpose should have been
to keep your patients safe.
And if you had done your job,
then you would have seen three women,
the very people that you were supposed to protect,
be assaulted by one of your doctors.
Isn't that true?
- Yes.
- Nothing further.
- Ms. Fuentes, you may step down.
Both counsel, approach.
♪ ♪
Ms. Rettstadt, if things keep going the way they're going,
I'm inclined to rule in favor
of the attorney general's office.
- Your Honor, I--
- However, I also understand
that Serolyte Pharmaceuticals
is at the forefront of a breakthrough medication
that has the potential to change the face
of mental health treatment,
perhaps under the right leadership--
- Hold on, Your Honor.
- The Serolyte board would not object
to removing Ms. Fuentes from her position
as CEO, Your Honor.
- In that case, I'd be inclined to deny the attorney general's
application to shut them down.
- Your Honor, respectfully, I disagree.
Three women have been victimized on Serolyte's watch.
- Victimized by Dr. Severson, who's out of the picture.
- Did SVU find any other instances
of therapists abusing patients?
- No, they did not.
But the potential for abuse is there.
And unless we shut them down until real changes are made,
it'll stay there.
- I admire your passion, Mr. Carisi,
but I don't think you've made your case.
You're welcome to take an appeal.
Step back.
♪ ♪
- Well, you went down swinging, Sonny.
I'll give you that.
- Yeah, well, thanks for a spot on the team.
- Any time. - Take care.
Well, you warned me that we were punching above our weight.
- Yeah, I did.
- So you're not gonna give me the "I told you so" speech?
- When I was a kid, my mom had an abortion.
Nearly killed her Catholic heart,
but the baby would have been born
with all kinds of problems.
All this information came out about this antidepressant
that she was using off and on.
And I remember this fancy lawyer, he came to our house,
and he wanted her to join a class-action lawsuit.
He told us that hundreds of babies
had been born with birth defects because of that drug.
- What did she do?
- The class action was denied certification.
Case never went to trial.
My mom, she--she couldn't afford to file
an individual claim, so--
so that was that.
- Carisi, Severson is behind bars.
Removing Fuentes is definitely gonna shake things up.
You didn't really lose this case today.
- Look at you with the pep talk.
Usually I'm the one telling you that we did all we could.
- Well, people change.
- What's this?
- A few files that you missed.
This one was a killer.
So the witness turned out to be a fabulist,
just makes up a whole bunch of details,
and then--and then the whole case fell apart at trial.
- Captain, I can explain what's going--
- I don't know why you're pulling my old cases.
I suspect it's because somebody told you to.
So you go ahead, Griff.
You look into anything you want.
Because I don't have any secrets.
And whatever mistakes I've made--and I'm sure
there have been a ton--
I stand by.
- Wait.
Look at this.
- What is that?
- It's from a shooting in a bar in the Upper West Side in 2001.
Look at it.
Involving a Lieutenant Jimmy Griffin.
[suspenseful music]
And Detective Kathryn Tynan.
♪ ♪
Yeah, you're right, I was tasked into looking
into your old cases, okay?
And I used that as cover to dig that up.
♪ ♪
- What are you planning on doing with this, Griff?
- I'm gonna find out the truth.
And I'm gonna give that to the commissioner.
I--I don't care what happens to me.
I don't care what happens to my dad's legacy after this.
Legacy--like, what the hell does that even mean?
Tynan--I mean, you know this.
Tynan--she's been there for me...
Through some very hard times, okay?
I--I cannot take any of this anymore.
I gotta know. I gotta know the truth.
- This is gonna blow everything up.
♪ ♪
Are you ready for that?
- No.
Are you?
♪ ♪
.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
[wolf howls]