Law & Order: Special Victims Unit

- 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.

Come on, Curry!

- Work the jab! Start with the jab!

- Come on, let's go. - Keep that left up, Curry!

- Come on! Let's go, killer!

Keep it up. Keep it up.

Careful, careful!

Get off the ropes!

- Come on, Curry. Get in there, get in there!

Yeah!

Come on, Curry!

Yes!

Yes!

Devastating. Never doubted you for a second.

- Killer Curry! Next stop Golden Gloves, am I right?

- Hey, how ya feelin', champ? Huh?

- I don't know, after months of training,

I kind of wish it went longer.

That makes one of us.

Nice work in there, partner.

OK, well,

this was the easiest 100 bucks that I ever made.

You were great! - Thanks, Cap.

- So, guys, drinks on me at Longshots?

- Mm-hmm. - Definitely.

- I'm not going to say no, you know?

All right.

I'll grab a shower and I'll meet you all there.

- Good. - OK.

- All right. - Hey.

- Tremendous.

Chief.

Didn't see you out there.

- I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

I have always been a fan, Captain.

- Always? All the way from Philly?

That's-- that's quite a compliment.

- Let's just say I've been educating myself.

A captain who's so dedicated to the mission of SVU

that she takes what is essentially a demotion

to work in that unit.

That's dedication.

- Well, it's a fulfilling assignment.

No regrets.

- Not much room for advancement, though.

You and I both know the challenges

in this department for women like us.

We're held to a different standard.

And yet, as far as you've come, here you are,

in a redundant position with no real authority.

But the good news is

there is a path to change that perception.

- Victim's name is Leyla Hartman.

Report came in to hotel security about an hour ago.

OK, what is all this?

- The best we can figure out is some sort of fan convention.

I've seen them on TikTok.

- All right, who's in charge here?

Hotel manager, Nate Smith.

Mr. Smith.

Hi, I'm Captain Benson, SVU.

Where's the victim?

- She's with the paramedics now.

Right.

- She was an attendee of the convention.

She said she was, um,

raped last night.

- OK. Did she say where the rape occurred?

- In a room on the 15th floor just after midnight.

Captain, if you could use some discretion.

We don't want to alarm our guests.

Right, OK.

So I'm going to need footage

from every single elevator and from the stairwells.

- We don't have cameras in the elevators or the floors.

My team checked the stairwell cameras and the elevator logs.

No one has come or gone from the 15th floor since midnight.

Lock it down.

- You got it. - Lock it? You can't.

- Mr. Smith, this hotel is a crime scene now,

so nobody leaves without an interview.

- So is there any insight to all of this?

Yeah, it's weird.

This Romeo kid, a potential suspect,

is some sort of ballet prodigy.

He blew up on social media, had over 300 fans here last night.

- OK, but the kid's talented, so what's--what's weird?

- It's the fans. They're intense.

They travel all over the country to these conventions.

They pay thousands of dollars to be, quote, "Superfans."

They pay for private lessons. They're obsessed.

- OK, well, I had a college boyfriend

that followed the Dead for almost a decade.

- Yeah, but your college boyfriend wasn't

sending the Dead college money and fantasizing

about the turning 18, so it would be legal.

How old is this kid?

- 16. Every person we talked to was a woman, 40s, 50s.

Said Romeo changed their lives, made them feel young again.

- Mm. - Definitely gives you the ick.

His mom supposedly runs everything.

Sets up all the cons, controls all the access to him.

- OK, you two head up to the 15th floor, interview everyone.

I'm going to talk to the victim.

And find this mother.

I want to talk to her.

- After the VIP event, Romeo asked me

to come to his room to help him talk to his mother.

W-what do you mean?

He wanted to stop performing

and he was afraid of her reaction.

Uh, I told him that I would be there for moral support.

Oh, so

he must have really trusted you

to ask you for that kind of help.

I thought so.

- OK, so you went to his room, right?

And what room was that?

Do you remember?

Um...

1550.

OK.

So can you walk me through what happened next?

- It was like a--a-- a switch flipped.

He just got this look.

like, an evil look,

and he attacked me.

- OK. You know what?

We don't need to do this now, OK?

So what's going to happen next is

I'm going to have the ambulance take you to the hospital

where you're going to get a SAFE exam.

- I'm not sure that I want that.

Oh, OK.

OK, well, it's entirely your decision.

You should know that it might help us with the investigation,

so, you know, why don't you-- why don't you

talk to the doctor about it?

All right.

Thank you.

Of course.

She's ready to go.

Go ahead.

Bruno, the crime scene room is 1550.

Body's cold.

No pulse. She's gone.

- Captain, we got a body, female.

I think it's Romeo's mother.

Yeah, it's Diane Martin.

- Possible blunt force trauma to the head.

We're in Romeo's room.

I'm on my way up.

Somebody went out the window.

Must have climbed into another room on this floor.

Trail stops three windows down.

That's room 1533.

Open it.

It's locked from the inside.

Take it.

NYPD!

Hey.

Please help me.

Get him up.

Let's go.

- Hey. There's no dad in the picture--he died six years ago.

Did Romeo ask for a lawyer yet?

Not a word,

but I wanted to take a peek in what we're dealing with.

Right.

- Kid's got over 2 million followers.

Oh.

You are worthy.

You deserve love.

You deserve to love yourself,

and I'm going to help you.

I'm going to keep you accountable.

We'll do this together.

Let's go.

- Well, he seems like a sweet kid.

Has he done anything questionable?

- Not that I can tell. It's all pretty wholesome.

Great, yes!

Everybody give it up for Alison!

Drop a thumbs up, drop a comment down below.

- So I looked into the mother's financials.

Mm-hmm.

- Past two years, she's taken in 600,000 in donations,

all from fans.