History Series / LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit

%%* InfantImmortality: Averted.

* AcquittedTooLate: the detectives of the SVU have a long and storied history when it comes to arresting the wrong person, making lots of public accusations regarding sex crimes, and then not even caring about the destruction they've caused to other people's lives.

** In ''Signature'', a male victim is found alongside a female victim of a particularly sadistic SerialKiller. The detectives theorize that he had the bad luck to come across the dump site in the act. [[spoiler: He was actually the killer, and was gunned down by TheProfiler as revenge for the murders, and for driving her mentor to suicide.]]
** A nonfatal (and [[AssShove literal]]) one is the {{Private Military Contractor}} CEO in ''Official Story'', who's sodomized instead of killed. [[spoiler:It's PayEvilUntoEvil by the PapaWolf dad of a girl the CEO himself had gang-raped before (and his ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections let him get away with it). But sadly overlaps with RevengeBeforeReason for the dad--the CEO's survival consequently lets him use his PMC for his own payback, and the episode becomes a RaceAgainstTheClock for the SVU to get him.]]

*** ''Mean'': The victim was part of a clique of popular girls who were known to be bullies; the victim in particular singled out an overweight classmate and tormented her for years. She was killed by the clique's AlphaBitch because she failed a SecretTestOfCharacter the killer had set up for her.
*** The victim in ''Angels'' was a pedophile who kept two boys captive to rape and abuse them. He was killed by another pedophile who objected to the victim's ''physical'' abuse of his children, but he believed that having sex with children didn't necessarily qualify as abuse, and had been "loving" his own stepson in this way for some time.

* AttemptedRape: Has happened several times to Olivia. In ''Undercover'', [[spoiler:she's nearly raped by a prison guard, but is saved by Fin.]] Then, in Season 15, Olivia is nearly raped in two different incidents by the same person,[[spoiler: William Lewis.]]

* TheBadGuysAreCops: At least in ''Bedtime''. Who killed Cal Cutler? [[spoiler: Oh look, it was the former patrol cop played by Jaclyn Smith! And another surprise! Cal Cutler isn't dead after all!]]

* BatmanGambit: ''Ace.'' D.A. Marlowe shows the team footage of one of the cases' important witness and evidence being destroyed by a car bomb. So the team focuses on a crooked doctor who goes on to (unintentionally) torpedo the entire case against the mafioso running the operation, by revealing something that was covered under privilege. [[spoiler: Turns out, the Feds found the bomb and orchestrated the ruse to appear the witness was killed while Marlowe has everyone else focus elsewhere on the case. The ruse also manages to deceive the mafioso as he is unable to intimidate the witness, as her parents were brought to the USA to prevent his associates from killing them in revenge.]]
* BavarianFireDrill: ''Authority''.
* BeCarefulWhatYouSay: In ''Sugar'', [[spoiler: when Vance Shepard finally confesses that it was his daughter (and not himself) who murdered his girlfriend, he notes that at the time she looked as if she might kill him too. When SVU gives him a few moments to say goodbye to her before they arrest her, she buries a pair of scissors in his neck.]]

* BlackRepublican: Fin is a registered republican who often times got into it with Detective John Munch, a Jewish Liberal. Over the course of the show, they became good friends.

** [[spoiler:Stuckey]] does this to Stabler in ''Zebras''.

* BrokenPedestal: In "Lunacy," [[spoiler:Dick Finley becomes this to Elliot when he finds out that he murdered an astronaut because of his ambition.]]

** Also in "Justice Denied," a man SVU put away eight years ago has continued to insist that his (recanted) confession was coerced and that he didn't commit a particularly brutal rape/assault, but no one believes him, in part because he knew a detail that was never made public; namely, that the scarf used to gag the victim was green. In the course of the episode, the victim mentions casually that [[spoiler:the scarf was actually ''red'', and subsequent investigation reveals that the officer who vouchered it was colorblind and wrote the wrong color into the report. At the end of the episode, the real culprit is found and the man who had served eight years for a crime he never committed is set free.]]

* CategorismAsAPhobia: In "Anchor," the villain of the week had killed a lot of immigrant children. The killer was overtly racist with his serial killing being an obvious hate-crime. But the defense lawyer somehow managed to convince the jury that the man couldn't help it - that his racism should be regarded as a mental illness. [[spoiler:The defense lawyer took the case because he had seen his father "swept by evil forces" (his father was a Klansman) and believed the same thing happened to his client, but he murdered the client after learning that he fully intended to kill again.]]

* ChainLinkFence:
* ChekhovsGunman:
* ChewingTheScenery: Sharon Stone does this in damn near every scene she has as ADA Jo Marlowe. It's particularly egregious in ''Shattered''.

* DirtyOldWoman: Rita Wills in ''Bedtime''

** The end of ''Smoked''. Despite the three men responsible for her mother's death being incarcerated (the rapist, the man the rapist hired to intimidate his victim but went one step further and murdered her, and an ATF agent who gave the murder weapon and then tried to cover it up), her daughter [[spoiler:goes into the precinct, and after finding out from Benson who they all are, shoots all three and also several other innocent people for no good reason. What's more is that the murderer survives and eggs her on, saying that he should have killed her as well. She then tries to shoot him again, but Stabler fatally wounds her and she dies moments later. At the end, at least four people are dead (the girl, the rapist and the ATF agent, and the recurring character Sister Peg), while the psychopath who murdered her mother right in front of her survives. ShootTheShaggyDog, full stop.]] Not to mention this leads to [[spoiler: Elliot Stabler leaving the force]].

* FakingTheDead: [[spoiler: Alex Cabot]]. Also, [[spoiler: Cal Cutler in ''Bedtime''.]]

** From ''Alternate'', Janis and her sister Cass are named after Janis Joplin and "Mama Cass" Elliot, both female inductees of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
** From ''Home'', Jacob, Adam, and Daniel are all Biblical names.

* IllKillYou: Spoken word for word by Ann Margaret in ''Bedtime''.

* JustOneLittleMistake: Susan Delzio in ''Bedtime''. [[spoiler: It turns out that the man everybody thought was dead was actually alive, hidden away by Susan.]]

* LikeGoesWithLike: The episode ''Snitch'' has an African man married to a couple of African women and a white one. In the end of the episode it's just him and his black wife.

** The episode ''Wannabe'' has a rookie officer make mistakes while apprehending a rapist that get the case thrown out. The "officer" turns out to be a teenager with a stolen uniform.

** ''Selfish" starts off being an episode about an irresponsible young mother who is reported for a "trunk that smells like death" by her own mother after her daughter goes missing, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Caylee_Anthony like the 2008 death of Caylee Anthony]]. It then ends up being about [[spoiler:whether or not people have the right to refuse to vaccinate their children.]]

** Another notable one was the guy at the hotel party in ''Taken''. [[spoiler: As usual, when there's one guy who's just ''gotta'' be the perp, he turns out not to be. To add the final Butt Monkey touch, he ends up prison-raped ''to death'' in Rikers before he can be released.]]

* RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: The monologue at the beginning of each episodes states that '' sexually based offences are considered especially heinous''.

** Possibly in "Imprisoned Lives" to the novel ''Room'', which also has a young boy with an odd way of talking because [[spoiler: his mother (though in the episode he doesn't know which of the women is his mother) was kidnapped as a child and after being born both were hidden in a tiny room]].

** S8:E2 (''Outsider'') ends with Chester Lake trying to coax a rapist/murderer to release a hostage by playing to his desire for attention, reasoning to him that taking a cop hostage will make him famous. This gives Fin a chance to shoot him and disable him long enough to be taken into custody.
** S14:E7 (''Vanity's Bonfire'') ends with a woman whose terminal brain tumor left her reliant on a cane to walk and too weak to handle a pitcher of water confessing to beating the head of her husband's physically healthy mistress in with a 20 pound hunk of crystal, while also swearing under oath that [[LetOffByTheDetective her 15 year old daughter]] came straight home from school that afternoon and never left the townhouse.
** S14:E22 (''Poisoned Motive'') sees this attempted when Fin speaks with his old Narcotics partner concerning multiple sniper attacks connected with them only to be presented with the weapon and a convincing MotiveRant centering on abandonment and betrayal. However it is rapidly made evident that motivation and marksmanship skill would not have let a man with a half-crippled leg escape the scene of the first shooting[[note]](a rooftop across from the precinct during a high profile perp-walk)[[/note]] as swiftly as the shooter did, but his twenty five year old daughter who was living with him, washed out of the U.S. Army and NYPD Academy due to emotional problems, and was still at large was a different matter entirely.

** Elliot and Olivia don't mind going undercover as a couple now and then, and Elliot's wife Kathy tells Olivia she's felt threatened by how much time Elliot spends on the job with Benson. Elliot himself says on several occasions that Benson and the job are the only things he has whenever he doesn't have his family, and he doesn't want to lose that. Olivia notably breaks down when Cragen tells her Elliot isn't coming back.

** For the past few seasons, the show has gotten a lot of mileage out of teasing Carisi and Rollins, though it was fairly [[DependingOnTheWriter inconsistent]] and it cropped up only a few times per season, if that. Until season 22, when it appears the writers have stopped playing coy and are now leaning into the shipping in a way that's pretty overt for the show.

* InTheBlood:
** The tragic and criminal pasts of several cast members and guest stars.
** A major plot point in "Hate": the defense for a man who killed Arabs out of hate argues that he carried out the murders due to the fact that he was biologically and genetically driven to hate and kill Arabs as a result of his father, who fought in Desert Storm. [[spoiler:Ultimately averted: the father didn't hate Arabs and actually remarried to an Arab woman. His mother taught him to hate Arabs out of spite.]]
** Also brought up in "Inheritance", where the defense argued that a man of mixed African-American and Asian descent raped women in Chinatown due to a genetic defect he inherited from his biological father, who was also a rapist. Olivia also ponders if she could've also inherited something from her father: both she and the rapist she collared were [[ChildByRape products of rape]] whose fathers were violent rapists.

''SVU'' is currently the only American ''Law & Order'' series still in active production, following the cancellation of ''[[Series/LawAndOrderCriminalIntent Criminal Intent]]'' in 2011. In 2019 it began production on its 21st season, thus surpassing the already incredibly long run of the Mothership. As with another famous and long-running crime drama, ''Series/{{NCIS}}'', it is suspected that the show will continue for as long as its star -- in this case Creator/MariskaHargitay -- wants to do it.

* BrickJoke: In a dark way. Where an Arab-hating teen kills a Middle Eastern fellow prisoner in a holding cell. It isn't brought back up again until the very last second of the episode, where Captain Craigen gets a phone call informing them the friends of said inmate just killed him in jail.

* BoundAndGagged: Stabler in ''Zebras'', Benson by the aforemntioned William Lewis. Naturally, this happens to many of the victims on the show as well. One infamous Hudson University fraternity had Pledge Week shirts with an illustrated hogtied and gagged woman with [[RefugeInAudacity "We Don't Take No For An Answer"]] written on the front.

* BodyDouble: Featured in both fall 2010 season openers. [[spoiler:In the first, a mom forces her foster daughter to become a duplicate of her missing real daughter to the point of giving the kid a nose job; in the second, a different mom believes her daughter to be this due to Capgras delusion. If the second mom ''hears'' her daughter, then the connection's still there, but it disappears the second she sees her.]]

* GamerChick: Partially deconstructed in "Bullseye", although there turns out to be more to the story. The detectives learn a young girl had been forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs and almost starved to death due to her mother and stepfather being total game addicts, more concerned about their kid in a video game than the actual living child in the home. However, the mother's situation turns out to be about more than game addiction: she is suffering from Capgras delusion, which makes her think that her daughter [[BodyDouble has been replaced by an imposter]], so she legitimately doesn't realize she's neglecting her child, instead thinking she's just ignoring the imposter. The real villain is the stepfather, who is in his right mind and knows full well who the girl is, but is just completely unconcerned.

* CassandraTruth: The mother in "Locum" insists that her daughter was lured away by an older girl with red hair who was wearing green shorts and an orange top, but the sheriff couldn't find a girl matching that description and was convinced the mother was making the whole thing up to cover for an OffingTheOffspring situation. Ten years later, SVU realizes she was telling the truth when they find that the initial suspect, a photographer, had a photo of a girl who fit the description right down to the clothes. The sheriff had asked him if he was ''traveling'' with a girl, but didn't ask if he'd ''seen'' a girl matching the mother's description, nor did he think to look through the photos taken around that time in case they contained any evidence.

* GamerChick: Zig-zagged in "Bullseye". The detectives learn a young girl had been forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs and almost starved to death due to her mother and stepfather being total game addicts, more concerned about their kid in a video game than the actual living child in the home. However, the mother's situation turns out to be about more than game addiction: she is suffering from Capgras delusion, which makes her think that her daughter [[BodyDouble has been replaced by an imposter]], so she legitimately doesn't realize she's neglecting her child, instead thinking she's just ignoring the imposter. The real villain is the stepfather, who is in his right mind and knows full well who the girl is, but is just completely unconcerned.

* GamerChick: Harshly deconstructed in "Bullseye". The detectives learn a young girl had been forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs and almost starved to death due to her mother and stepfather being total game addicts, more concerned about their kid in a video game than the actual living child in the home. The mother at least has an excuse -- she used to be a loving mom, but was hit by a bus six months previously and is now suffering from a head injury which has led her to believe that her daughter [[BodyDouble is an imposter]] who has replaced her real daughter -- but the stepfather is just completely unconcerned.

** For the past few seasons, the show has gotten a lot of mileage out of teasing Carisi and Rollins, though it's fairly [[DependingOnTheWriter inconsistent]] and crops up only a few times per season, if that. It has been pushed more towards the romantic side, however, since Carisi has left SVU to join the DA's office.

* GamerChick: Harshly deconstructed in "Bullseye". The detectives learn a young girl had been forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs and almost starved to death due to her mother and stepfather being total game addicts, more concerned about their kid in a video game than the actual living child in the home. The mother at least has an excuse -- she was hit by a bus six months previously and is now suffering from a head injury which has led her to believe that her daughter [[BodyDouble is an imposter]] who has replaced her real daughter -- but the stepfather is just completely unconcerned.

* PutOnABus: Alex Cabot. [[spoiler:She got better... or rather her would-be killers got worse.]]
** [[spoiler: She voluntarily went back on the bus after a witness told her about the horrific rapes in Africa and joined an NGO to prosecute the rapists for crimes against humanity. She came back after the summer.]]

** Starting on Season 13, Elliot Stabler. He took early retirement but from Olivia and Cragen's reactions you'd have thought he AteHisGun [[spoiler: like his father]].
** Dr. Huang as well. No explanation was given for almost a year, until TheBusCameBack in Father Dearest, and he mentioned that he had been reassigned to... Oklahoma.

* {{Transplant}}: Three of the show's main cast members are this; Donald Cragen from [[Series/LawAndOrder the parent series]], JustForFun/JohnMunch from ''Series/HomicideLifeOnTheStreet'', and Peter Stone from ''Series/ChicagoJustice''.

'''Blaine:''' Still Looking. Stuck with me for now.

** "Clock" features a girl who [[OlderThanTheyLook looked like a child]] even though she was seventeen, and her boyfriend was a convicted pedophile. The detectives were disgusted with this relationship, feeling it was unhealthy and that his only interest in her was due to her looking like a child -- however, it was completely legal since the girl was over the age of consent, so her choice was valid even if the detectives thought something was iffy about the relationship (and they may be right to think so, but she still has the right to make that decision for herself).

** In "Persona" Linnie[[spoiler:/Caroline]] admits to having an abortion in the 70s after getting pregnant due to being repeatedly raped by her then-husband (whom she killed to stop the abuse). Her current husband (who she never told about her past) is upset at her for this, since she knew he wanted children, and says Linnie denied him that (along with grandchildren). Due to this, along with keeping her past secret, he leaves Linnie.

* GamerChick: Harshly deconstructed in "Bullseye". The detectives learn a young girl had been forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs and almost starved to death due to her mother and stepfather being total game addicts, more concerned about their kid in a video game than the actual living child in the home. The mother at least has an excuse -- she was hit by a bus six months previously and is now suffering from a head injury which has led her to believe that her daughter [[BodyDouble is an imposter]] ''pretending'' to be her daughter -- but the stepfather is just completely unconcerned.

** In one episode, a man breaks into a woman's apartment intending to rape her to teach her racist grandfather (who had raped the man's mother several decades earlier) a lesson, but changes his mind. Unfortunately, the aforementioned racist grandfather convinced her that no one would believe her unless she claimed a rape had taken place. The episode makes it clear that the grandfather, not the accuser (who is horrified when she realizes the "advice" was just more of her grandfather's racism), is the real villain.

** Sophie Gerard in ''Shattered''. Do ''not'' tell her that [[spoiler: her son is dead and not coming back.]]

* LastOfHisKind: The only remaining first-run series in a franchise that once roamed the NBC schedule like buffalo. Within the cast itself, Olivia is the sole original cast member left starting the fifteenth season.