Law & Order/Season 21

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Law & Order (1990–2010, 2022-) is a long-running police procedural and courtroom drama television series, created by Dick Wolf.

The Right Thing [21.01]

Bernard: Every victim deserves our respect. Even the ones that raped forty women.

Cosgrove: It's these damn cameras. They cause a lot of trouble.

Bernard: Maybe. That's one way to look at it. Another is that cameras keep us accountable.

Bernard: First time in twenty years people actually care about a Black man getting shot.

Lt. Dixon: That's funny. If it was a joke. If not, you can save your speech for someone else, because I am not in the mood for politics right now.

Cosgrove: [to Price] I'm a cop. A good one. I catch 'em, you cook 'em. That's how this is supposed to work. Like it or not, I get paid to lie to people like Nicole Bell. Stop trying to save the world and do your damn job.

Price: [about Nicole] She put on a hell of a show today.

Maroun: Jury ate it up, too. Juror number four had tears in her eyes.

Price: I get it. Her story's heartbreaking. But they have to know that she's lying, that this self-defense claim is nonsense.

Maroun: They know. They just don't care.

Price: Henry King did some horrible things. He took something from Nicole Bell that she can never get back. Unfortunately, in the eyes of the law, that doesn't matter. When a good woman kills a horrible man in cold blood, it's called murder.

McCoy: It's okay to play the hero, Nolan, as long as you win.

Maroun: I'm a prosecutor. I'm sworn to enforce the laws of this state. Yet I understand the defendant's desire for revenge, for street justice. Nine years ago, my sister was raped and murdered in Georgia. Police never arrested the offender. But I knew who did it. Police knew, too. Just couldn't prove it. So it's easy to understand the defendant's rage, her desire for vengeance, her need for this son of a bitch to pay for what he did to her, to suffer like he made her suffer. When Henry King was released from prison, the defendant's thirst for revenge escalated. Maybe she even began to fantasize about killing him. Pictured herself grabbing a gun, going to his house, waiting for him to show up. She probably even planned what she was going to say, where she was going to shoot him. Those types of fantasies are perfectly normal. Trust me. They're also perfectly legal. But to actually take the life of another human being, to wait outside someone's house and shoot him five times in cold blood, that's not only wrong, that's criminal. Just ... Just because you're suffering and you're filled with anger doesn't mean you get to play God. Now that doesn't mean you shouldn't have tremendous sympathy for the defendant, that you shouldn't appreciate the pain and the suffering she endured. So, when you go back to the jury room to deliberate, give yourself permission to feel sorry for her. But that doesn't mean she's innocent, that she should walk free. This case comes down to one simple question. Did Nicole Bell intentionally shoot and kill Henry King? If the answer is yes, you must convict.

Impossible Dream [21.02]

Bernard: Big tech has changed the world. Electric cars, artificial intelligence, virtual reality.

Cosgrove: Hard to keep up.

Bernard: Is that your way of saying that you're not happy with it?

Cosgrove: Just because it's shiny doesn't mean it's good.

Price: There are a lot of reasons Kyle's DNA could be on that coat.

Lt. Dixon: That is correct. But the most obvious one is that she was wearing it when she shot his ass in cold blood.

Lt. Dixon: [to Price] I want Nina Ellis off the streets and the public to know that these tests are phony. We're arresting her today. Whether or not you charge her with murder is on you.

Price: Nina Ellis thinks that she's special, that the rules of society don't apply to her. That the ends always justify the means. That killing your fiancé is just another cost of doing business. But make no mistake - the poised, successful woman you see at the defense table is a cold-blooded killer, as cold-blooded as they come.

Maroun: [looking suspiciously at Price's takeout] What's "jiang reed"?

Price: Better not to ask.

Maroun: What's that mean?

Price: It means it's really good, but it's better not to know what you're actually eating. [pause] It's sauteed crickets.

Maroun: Seriously?

McCoy: "No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar."

Price: Abraham Lincoln?

McCoy: Yeah, well, things have changed since he was around. Honesty isn't exactly in vogue any more. People lie. Even worse, people have gotten used to it. It's become an accepted part of our society, which is why it's so dangerous.

Filtered Life [21.03]

Man: Remember when this park was a refuge from tourists?

Woman: You mean back in the '80s, when it was full of drug dealers and riots?

Man: The good old days.

Cosgrove: We'll need you and Megan to come down to the precinct with us.

Bass: [nervously] Uh, okay. Why?

Cosgrove: Because you're lying your ass off.

Lt. Dixon: Maybe she has a stalker.

Cosgrove: She made it easy for him. Posted every detail of her life and her future plans. A predator's dream.

Lt. Dixon: I know you're not implying that this is her fault.

Cosgrove: No, I'm just making an observation. Call me old fashioned, call me paranoid, I don't give a rat's ass, that is why my kids don't have social media in the house.

Maroun: There's a lot of money in being an influencer.

Price: Your point?

Maroun: All they have to do is convince one juror that there's a possibility that Amanda is alive, that this is all a publicity stunt, and we have a mistrial.

Price: So, let's keep all social media addicts and aspiring influencers off the jury.

Maroun: That's pretty much everyone under 30.

Price: And everyone with negative views of social media stars.

Maroun: That's pretty much everyone over 30.

Fault Lines [21.04]

Bernard: Looks like our D.O.A. was a judge.

Cosgrove: Not the verdict he was looking for.

Clerk: It's family court. Everyone who walks in is having the worst day of their life.

Cosgrove: Judge's wife said he was preoccupied.

Bernard: Nothing like a side piece to preoccupy someone. Also doubles the chances of you getting bludgeoned to death in a parking garage.

Lt. Dixon: Forensics came back on the fire extinguisher. They recovered a hair. Didn't belong to the victim and it didn't match anyone in the system.

Bernard: Well, that eliminates Weisman.

Lt Dixon: I sent to a private lab for geneology and disease analysis.

Bernard: Pulling out all the stops, huh?

Lt. Dixon: He was a judge, Kevin. C'mon, you know I wish we had the resources to go the extra mile for every unsolved, but we don't.

Bernard: Funny how they always manage to find the cash when the victim's a white dude from the Upper East Side, but when it's a poor Black kid from East Flatbush? "Oh, I'm sorry, we don't have it in the budget."

Lt. Dixon: I hear you...

Bernard: Do you?

Free Speech [21.05]

Reed: [about Hoyt] I heard he was running for Congress and the power brokers in the Democratic Party were making him out to be the best new thing. Like AOC with some brains. [chuckles] That was a joke. Sorry. Didn't mean to offend your left wing sensibilities.

Bernard: You didn't offend us. It wasn't funny.

Reed: I run a media business. I give the people what they want. Real people. Real, honest, hard-working, middle class people who love this country, who can't relate to the rich, coastal elites who control the media and the political narrative. C'mon, you really think some roofer from Akron with a mortgage and three kids gives a rat's ass about somebody's pronoun?

Bernard: So you don't really believe that liberals eat babies or that Black people's obsession with racism is destroying the country?

Reed: It doesn't matter what I believe. It matters what sells.

Computer tech: The post was sent from a cafe in Brooklyn called Coffee'n'Smile.

Cosgrove: Why has it become mandatory for coffee shops to be called stupid names?

Lt. Dixon: That's why I drink tea.

Price: Inventing mythical enemies is part of the defendant's business model. He creates clickbait. He provides exciting liberal enemies for his followers to hate. He then posts about these dangerous fascists and anti-Americans on his websites, talks about them on his streaming platform and podcasts. But the only thing he really cares about is money. Monetizing the outrage and venom, that's how the defendant builds his billion dollar media empire. In simplest terms, he made Derek Hoyt an enemy of the far right, then offered Manny Lopez, a misguided but intelligent, patriotic ex-Marine, a financial reward to kill that enemy. And Manny Lopez did. He pushed Derek Hoyt in front of a bus. Tomorrow, you'll hear Mr. Lopez describe this murder for hire in greater detail, and make it clear that the defendant should be held accountable for Mr. Hoyt's death.

Rems: Chat room posts, social media rants, they're protected under the First Amendment. Jordan Reed can say whatever the hell he wants. He can talk about liberal cannibals and underage sex trafficking rings all day long.

Price: Your client cried fire in a crowded movie theater, and Derek Hoyt got trampled to death. We have every right to move forward on Murder Two.

Judge Baker: I agree with Mr. Price. There is a case here. I don't know if it's winnable, but it's certainly tryable. So, let's do it.

Maroun: Hell of a verdict, Nolan. It'll make people think twice about tweeting venom.

Price: I'm not so sure. Someone called "Garrett From the Country" just tweeted me a particularly venomous death threat.

Wicked Game [21.06]

Bernard: Who found the body?

Medical examiner: [pointing to the witness] She was walking to work and saw the fancy trunk. Tried to wheel it off, realized there was something inside, opened it up. She wasn't expecting to find a bare-assed dead dude, that's for sure.

Bernard: Mama always said you see something in the street, leave it be.

[Bernard and Cosgrove have just talked to a murder victim's family who disowned him for being gay]

Cosgrove: I can't believe what I just heard. What is this, 1954? Kickin' a kid out because you think he "chose" to be gay?

Bernard: Crazy, but it's still a thing in my community, especially among the religious folks.

Cosgrove: I don't get it.

Bernard: Don't get what?

Cosgrove: People - Black people. Here you are, marching in the streets for police reform, all these progressive laws, but if your kid turns out to be gay? Well, he needs counseling. You need to make him "right with God". You ask me, that's what you need to be marching about.

Bernard: OK, you're right, but don't act like your people are much better. You still can't have premarital sex, for God's sake.

Cosgrove: Reason number 36 why I don't go to church anymore.

Andre: [about Swanson] He would tell me to take off my clothes, and he'd tell me to pretend like I was his... servant. He would use a different word, of course, but I refuse to say it out loud. Then, ah... he would tie me up, and start to shoot me up with meth.

Cosgrove: He would just just watch you get high? That was exciting to him?

Andre: No, man, it was way more screwed up than that. It was like he would walk your ass up to Heaven's gates and decide whether you would get to live or die. Sick son-of-a-bitch thought he was God, or somethin'.

Swanson: [to Maroun] You'll never convict me. You know that, right?

Price: Swanson is a very dangerous, evil man.

McCoy: But, at the moment, he's still a very well-respected, very well-connected businessman, with ties to some of the most influential politicians in the country. Not to mention he supported my opponent in the last election. So, he'll claim we're biased, that this is all payback.

Price: What are you saying?

McCoy: If we're going to try to kill the king, we can't miss.

Legacy [21.07]

Bernard: It's time we had a chat with Mr. Pratt.

Cosgrove: Oh, I love it when you rhyme.

Bennett: My father told me to stand up for myself. Be strong. Someone hits you, you hit back. There's nothing wrong with that.

Maroun: You brought a gun to a fistfight. You fired that gun and killed an innocent man. There's no walking that back.

Price: If we have learned anything over the last decade, it's that locking up disturbed kids doesn't prevent more school shootings. It's proven to be an ineffective deterrent. We have to try a different approach. We need to send a message. We need to hold more people accountable, people who should intervene.

McCoy: Hell of a speech if you were running for office. But you're not. You're a prosecutor, and your job is to follow the law and get justice for victims.

Severance [21.08]

Cosgrove: You don't have to like the people you work with.

Bernard: Is he sending us a message, Kate?

Lt. Dixon: Probably. But luckily, I don't care.

Cosgrove: Emails weren't hard to find. She saved them under a folder titled "Threats."

Fisher: I haven't been subpoenaed in 15 years.

McCoy: That means you aren't trying hard enough.

Price: I still think he's lying.

McCoy: My old boss, he used to say that lawyers who need to be right lose more cases than those who don't.

The Great Pretender [21.09]

Kornfeld: [about Ella] She was part of the Whitlock clan - old money.

Cosgrove: The best kind there is.

[Cosgrove tricks a suspect into revealing key information]

Bernard: You keep surprising me, Frank.

Cosgrove: I don't sell shoes for a living.

Zanini: My client has an opioid addiction.

Judge Greenough: Let's cut to the chase. You're asking me to send him to rehab?

Zanini: Yes, in-patient rehab so he can get treatment.

Maroun: He can detox in Rikers, like everyone else.

Price: Don't let his looks fool you. Charles Ackman is nothing more than a drug trafficker. The only difference is the type of narcotic he sells. Oh, and the way he's treated by society. Heroin dealers get life. Oxy dealers get stock options.

Black and Blue [21.10]

Benson: It's hard enough being a cop these days. The last thing we need is losing one of our own.

Price: You can't prove what actually happened. You can only guess. That's the issue. We don't know what happened. And in this political climate, there's no way a jury is going to convict a woman for murder one based on these facts.

Cosgrove: You mean there's no way they're ever going to convict a Black woman for shooting a white cop. That's what you're really saying, isn't it? Because if Kendra Daniels was white...

Price: But she's not. She's Black. There's a certain reality to that fact that if you don't understand that, or you can't appreciate that, that's on you. I'm doing the best I can with the facts and the evidence I have. I'm sorry you don't approve, but don't you dare question my integrity.

Cosgrove: Or what?

Bernard: Hey! That's enough. The man's just doing his job.

Cosgrove: His job is to prosecute Kendra Daniels to the fullest extent of the law, not make excuses for her just because she's Black.

Bernard [stepping in] Hey, give me a second, Price. [to Cosgrove] Hey, man. You gotta back down.

Cosgrove: That woman shot and killed Jimmy Doyle, Kev. And she knew he was a police officer. That's it. That's all that matters.

Bernard: That's what you believe, Frank? Hmm? You believe it's that simple? A Black woman and a white cop? Hmm? [Cosgrove walks off]

Bernard: Hey, Price.

Price: Yeah.

Bernard: Frank is a good man. Says what he feels, and right now he's feeling a lot of pain. And for the record... I respect what you're doing. Takes a lot of guts to stare down NYPD on a case like this.

Maroun: [after Price loses the case] You know, a really smart prosecutor once told that if you try a good case, the jury is always right, even if it doesn't feel good.