Law & Order Special Victims Unit s05e22 Episode Script
Painless
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.
This apartment's not scheduled until 1:00.
If we get in trouble, I'm blaming you.
We clean the place early, we go home early.
The lady's gonna be pissed if she walks in and we scare the crap out of her.
That's the beauty of it, the lady got a new job.
She'll be gone all day.
How do you know? Janey cleaned this apartment last week.
Eww.
The bathroom is disgusting.
No wonder.
That lazy bitch always does a half-assed job.
Oh, my God! What? Oh, she's dead.
She's dead.
Call the cops.
Just get me an ambulance right now.
Ma'am, ma'am, lady.
Lady, ma'am, ma'am, can you hear me? Ma'am? She's not breathing! Lady, come on, wake up.
Ma'am? Her name is Christina Nerrit.
Unconscious, but EMS said she was breathing on her own the whole way in.
Do we know what made her unconscious? Cleaning woman found her handcuffed with a plastic bag taped over her head.
We don't know how long she was deprived of oxygen.
We're doing an EEG to assess brain activity.
Rape kit? Negative for hairs and fluids.
And the paramedics say her hair was soaked when they found her.
Soon as I know more, I'll call you.
Victim was wet.
Perp must have tried to clean her up.
So much for trace evidence.
ME's office, urgent.
Crime Scene sent urine samples from the toilet in the victim's bathroom.
Even you can't get DNA back that fast.
No, but I ran other tests.
Urine's got high levels of creatinine and blood urea nitrogen, both by-products of protein.
What does that mean? Your victim or your perp is dying of kidney failure.
The neighbor down the hall said the victim was some kind of artist.
How did you guys do? Middle of the day, hardly anyone around.
The maids didn't hear or see squat.
And unfortunately, this building doesn't have security cameras.
So all we've got is a perp who may have kidney failure.
The urine I sent to the ME came from two spots I found on the rim of the bowl.
What makes you so sure it's the perp's? The victim's a woman living alone, the toilet seat was up.
Some guys never learn.
Soap's wet, so your theory that the perp made her take a shower holds water.
I'll check the drain for hairs.
The only thing that doesn't make sense is the bed.
What about it? Guy goes to all this trouble to cover his tracks, leaves the sheets.
Why? Cash and credit cards are still in her wallet along with this receipt from this morning.
Restaurant at the Hotel Kennedy.
$70, had to be at least two people eating.
So Christina buys him breakfast, he rapes her for lunch.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember her.
Breakfast rush, table 10.
She with anyone? Uh, some suit.
You know, custom shirt, $100-tie.
Wish I had the balls to spill something on it.
Bad tipper? The guy takes one bite of his potatoes, spits them out, and starts screaming.
He told me, "No salt.
" He's got a health problem? Yeah, or a mental problem.
I mean, I write everything down.
He never said, "No salt.
" Remember anything else? Uh, the woman seemed a little PMS mood-wise, I bring out the coffee, she's all happy and smiley.
When I come back with the entree, she's bawling like a baby.
About what? I don't stand around eavesdropping.
You didn't happen to hear the guy's name either? No.
No, but I can get it for you.
It's not gonna be there.
She paid for breakfast.
Yeah, but he had a bar tab, a couple of Bloody Marys while he was waiting for her.
Yeah, that's it.
A guy named Brooks Harmon, corporate credit card, Blossner House Publishing.
I'd just hired Christina as Director of Medical Illustration.
Will she be okay? We're waiting to hear from the hospital.
I felt something was wrong when she didn't show up for the staff meeting.
I tried her cell phone but it went right to voicemail.
Did Christina tell you where she was going? Home, to pick up a few things, then she was coming right back here.
Anything bothering her? Not that I know of.
We were celebrating her new position.
Really? Because we heard that she was crying.
Christina is our best freelance illustrator.
She has no management experience.
She was anxious about being able to handle the job.
Do you have a problem handling salt, Mr.
Harmon? No, I just don't like the whole shaker being poured over my breakfast.
What does it have to do with Christina? Can you tell us where you went after the breakfast? Straight back to the office.
You didn't answer my question.
You're the last person seen with Christina before she was attacked.
That makes me a suspect? Not if you don't mind letting our medical examiner take some blood for a DNA sample to rule you out.
No problem.
When? Tomorrow.
We'll, uh, set it up and give you a call.
Any time is fine.
Thanks for the help.
That was Cragen.
He wants us to re-canvass all the tenants who weren't there when we got there.
What, Munch and Fin take a personal day? They're at the hospital.
Christina's awake.
I was opening the door to my apartment when he came up behind me, said he had a gun, told me not to scream.
After you got inside, what did he do? He made me take off my clothes and lie in bed.
He said he'd kill me if I looked at him.
Then he Cuffed me to the headboard and raped me.
What happened next? He put the bag over my head.
Thank God, the maids found me.
Were you ever able to get a look at him? No.
I was too scared.
Christina.
Oh.
My sister, Allison.
These men are police detectives.
Here's your laptop, but I wish you would just get some rest.
No, working will help me forget what happened.
We can give you the names of some counselors.
I'm not talking to any shrinks.
Ahem, I'm sorry.
I didn't mean to snap like that.
L I You're just trying to help.
A couple of big holes in her story.
Christina gets home at 10:00, the maids find her at 11:30.
Meaning she and the perp were alone for hour and half.
That's a long time not to get a look at him.
Doesn't mean she made it up.
She didn't mention takin' a shower.
A rapist makes you clean up, now, that's a hard thing to forget.
Not to mention the fact that he happens to sneak out in the nick of time.
Couldn't have had more than six minutes after he put the bag on her head or she would have asphyxiated.
Anything from the second canvass? Just that that is the only way in or out of that building.
Either no one wants to fess up to letting a stranger in, or they really didn't see him.
Maybe candid camera did.
The store has got one pointing this way.
I cued it back to just before 10:00, like you said, zoomed it in.
Christina, right on time.
Nobody followed her in.
Fast forward it to 11:30.
I don't have to.
I already dubbed the tape.
Hold it.
Look at that.
Brooks Harmon.
He rapes her, but he used a condom.
That's why he gave us the DNA.
So, you went in at 11:10 and you left at 11:30.
What were you doing there, Brooks? I wanted to make sure she was okay.
Why wouldn't she be? Because she never came back to work.
I knocked on her apartment door.
No answer.
So you stayed for 20 minutes, at the same time she happened to be suffocating? I swear I had nothing to do with it.
You called your office to cancel your 11:00 a.
m.
Staff meeting.
That sounds to me like you had some place to go.
Brooks, I'm gonna tell you what I think.
You tried to kill Christina so your wife wouldn't find out you were banging her, hm? Okay.
We were having an affair.
So why didn't you just tell us that? I was trying to end it at breakfast.
That's why Christina was crying.
Are you sure that it wasn't because you told her you wanted to tie her up? What are you talking about? We found your handcuffs, Brooks.
I don't do that.
Toilet seat was up, you do that? What the hell does that mean? It means you sprinkle when you tinkle.
Our medical examiner tested the urine you left behind.
You're dying of kidney failure.
That's impossible, I I just had a physical.
I am in perfect health.
Mr.
Harmon, I'm Capt.
Cragen.
There's been a misunderstanding.
You're free to go.
I can leave? With our apologies.
You people are nuts.
Captain? Warner thinks it's somebody else, I sent Munch and Fin to see her.
I found cervical cells in the urine.
Whoever used the toilet is female.
And it's not Christina? If her kidneys were failing, it would have shown up in her blood-work from the ER.
Christina's labs all came back normal.
So the person with her was a woman.
Christina's a bisexual? Harmon knocks on the door, she doesn't answer because she's with her girlfriend.
She makes Christina take a shower, she cuffs her to the bed and tapes a bag over her head.
But instead of having sex, the bitch leaves Christina to suffocate.
So why is Christina crying rape to protect her? I don't want to talk about it.
She tried to kill you.
It it was an accident.
Doesn't look that way.
She threaten you not to talk? No.
Look, I'm not here to judge you, believe me.
But no matter how much you love this woman, she doesn't deserve your loyalty.
What happened in my apartment was was not a crime.
Falsely reporting a rape is.
I'm really tired, I'd I'd like to go back to my room.
I need you to tell me what really happened.
Don't worry about me.
Are you all right? Yes, I'm okay now.
Whoa, whoa! We need some help here.
I need some help, now.
Help! Stabilize her head.
The medical examiner's on the way.
We're treating Miss Nerrit's death as suspicious.
What happened to her? Severe hypoglycemic shock.
Her blood sugar crashed.
Doctors did a finger stick when they were trying to resuscitate her.
She had a glucose level of two.
That sounds low.
Oh, yeah.
Normal is around 90.
So I ran some tests on blood drawn during the code.
Miss Nerrit's insulin level was five times normal.
Are you saying she was murdered? I can't say anything official yet, of course, but someone injected Miss Nerrit with a massive dose of insulin.
When? No more than 15, 20 minutes before seizures began.
Hospital pharmacy went through their inventory.
All their insulin is accounted for.
Someone brought it in from the outside.
Christina had any visitors besides her sister? Staff didn't notice anyone.
Perp could have been dressed like they work here.
Or the real deal, psycho doc or killer nurse, like that guy in Jersey gets off watching people die.
Either one would have access to insulin.
You'd better be sure about this.
The hospital pathologist said Christina was definitely injected.
I get stuck with a needle and die, and my husband and kids get both your pensions.
Now we just have to find the right syringe.
How are we gonna know? That's the easy part.
Hospitals order one brand in bulk.
This one is different from the others.
Hospital confirms it never used that brand of syringe.
The lab found prints on the cylinder and plunger and traces of insulin.
Injected how? No needle punctures in Christina's body, so it had to be through the port in her IV.
Young, otherwise healthy, about to be discharged.
An angel of mercy usually likes them old and sick.
Hospital hasn't had a suspicious death in years.
We're checking the personnel files just in case.
Could be our mystery woman didn't want to risk Christina ratting her out.
Christina's sister Allison was the last person seen in her hospital room.
The sister have a reason to want Christina dead? She may have killed herself.
Where'd you get that? Computer Crimes just found something very interesting on her laptop.
Gentlemen, uh, your so-called victim has been doing a little blogging.
That's daily, almost hourly visits to one website.
"Catchingthetrain.
Com.
" Catching the train where? Apparently to the afterlife.
It's a bunch of people talking about suicide.
Listen to this: "Welcome to the station, the train's pulling in.
Click here for your ticket to everlasting peace.
" Can you believe that? Christina Nerrit's handle on this site was CU, as in later.
Who was she writing to? Mostly, someone with the screen name Conductor.
That's why she was so hot for a laptop at the hospital.
She wanted to chat with these whackos.
Christina started a thread the day you found her entitled, "Still here".
"Christina: Missed the train today.
Conductor: What happened?" "Christina: Maids came early and found me, ripped the bag off.
I'm in the hospital.
" "Conductor " "What now? "Christina: Something quick before anyone figures it out.
Conductor: Hospitals have insulin.
" The first time Christina tries to off herself, she lives.
She made sure that wouldn't happen again.
We've got plenty of cases with living victims.
We've got to move on if this was a suicide.
Assisted suicide, Captain.
That's second degree manslaughter.
Maybe Christina's mystery girlfriend with kidney failure is our Conductor.
We can ID her off her ISP.
I found where Christina ordered her insulin.
Online prescription mail, Staten Island.
Police.
Stand up, step away from your computers and do not touch anything.
I'm Marvin Friedman, Chairman, CEO.
You can wait outside until our lawyers arrive.
This is a warrant signed by a federal judge allowing us to look for evidence.
Your company dispenses medication without prescriptions.
Everything we do here is legal.
How'd this woman buy insulin from you to kill herself? I don't know.
She probably lied on the questionnaire.
Our doctors won't send anything out to anyone unless they've signed the medical records.
Right, I'm sure you decline any order that may be unnecessary or dangerous.
I don't have to answer that.
I bet these, uh, so-called doctors will, once we threaten to take their licenses.
What do you want from me? Check when that order went out.
It went out overnight two days ago.
You keep all these invoices in your head? She called me, frantic because I wouldn't ship it to her post office box.
Where did she have the insulin sent? Her home address.
I'm packing up Christina's things.
Guess I'll give most of it away.
What are you looking for? Any packages that came after Christina went into the hospital? Um, just this.
You know what's in it? I think it's insulin.
Christina wasn't diabetic.
Allison, we think your sister used insulin to kill herself.
No, that can't be, I mean, it's right here.
She couldn't get it, so someone got it for her.
If Christina committed suicide, then why are the police interested? Because someone helped her and that's a crime.
Did any of Christina's friends have keys to the apartment? Christina didn't have any friends.
Allison, I need to know where you were yesterday.
You think it was me? I have to ask.
You were the last one seen with her in the hospital before she died.
I loved her, I would never help her kill herself.
Sorry to interrupt.
That's okay, we're done.
I'd like to finish packing.
Computer Crimes found our Conductor.
Dr.
Amy Solwey? Just a second.
Uh, these men are police officers.
Can you help us out here? Dets.
Munch and Tutuola.
We need to talk to you in private.
My assistant can translate.
This is official business.
We'll call an interpreter down to our precinct.
Fine.
Just give me a moment.
Should we call you Dr.
Solwey or Conductor? Conductor on the Internet.
In person, my name is Amy.
So, Amy, how do you know Christina Nerrit? I'm sorry.
I don't.
How about CU from the Catchingthetrain website? That's my site.
I know the name.
Did you help Christina Nerrit kill herself? I gave her advice.
Bad advice.
She didn't think so, she was in pain.
And suicide was the cure? What kind of doctor are you? PhD, I'm an embryologist.
So you help women get pregnant and in your spare time you tell them how to kill themselves? By telling them exactly how to do it.
"If you're using cyanide, "mix it with water and test the Ph.
"Make sure it's not too acidic or alkaline so it doesn't burn going down.
" Your website is like Suicide for Dummies.
My website also prevents people from killing themselves.
But it's just talk, you know, free speech.
And where were you two days ago, Amy, around lunchtime? I was at work.
Ask my assistant.
You don't seem too upset about Christina's death.
I'm not.
She's happy now.
I'm sure she called to thank you right after she died.
Christina didn't commit a crime, and neither did I.
Now if that's all, I've got to get back to work.
Thank you.
An officer will drive you.
She's lying.
How do you know that? Her coat, it's Burberry.
I've seen it before.
Where? There, you can't see her face, but that's Amy Solwey leaving Christina's building.
Two minutes after Christina's boss.
He was banging on the door for 15 minutes.
Amy must have waited until after he left so he wouldn't see her.
Probably helped her put on the cuffs and the bag.
The urine on the toilet belonged to a woman.
It's got to be Amy's.
How do you know that? She's probably got Allport's Syndrome.
It's a rare genetic disorder that causes deafness and kidney failure.
Is that enough to collar her? I'd like to connect her to the insulin first.
She works in a doctor's office.
Not all doctors keep insulin around.
Hers would.
It's a fertility clinic, an OBIGYN.
They need it for the pregnant women with the gestational diabetes.
The insulin is stored upstairs.
We have no use for it down here.
The warrant covers the entire office.
Please, you are literally holding potential lives in your hands.
You must know what that's like.
I've got the insulin.
Where'd you find it? Desk in her office.
Amy Solwey, you are under arrest for assisting a suicide.
You have the right to remain silent.
If you give up that right, anything you say can be used against you in a court of law.
You have the right to an attorney.
Man Two is a stretch.
You're wrong about my client.
Any advice Amy gave Christina regarding suicide is protected by the First Amendment.
As deplorable as I find her website, if all she did was exercise her right to free speech, we wouldn't be here.
We can explain those insulin vials in her office.
After they give birth, our gestational diabetes patients sometimes bring their leftover insulin back to the office.
Last week a woman gave me hers.
She got busy, put them in her desk and forgot about them, honest mistake.
Nice try, but the syringe used to inject Christina is the same brand used in your client's office.
And thousands of other doctor's offices, clinics and hospitals.
We have her on tape leaving Christina's building just before she was found.
Is that a coincidence, too? Christina called me, asked me if I could come over, I met her in the hallway.
She told me her plans, I tried to talk her out of it.
Really? Doesn't that go against your whole belief system? You can't possibly understand.
You're right.
We don't.
Why are we debating this? Nobody saw Amy enter Christina's apartment or hospital room.
If she's innocent, give us blood for DNA.
Doctor Huang is right on the money.
Amy Solwey has Allport's Syndrome.
The woman's a scientist, she's got to know we had something on her.
Why agree to a blood test? Probably because she thought she could fool us by giving right after dialysis.
But her kidneys are in such bad shape, the dialysis only helped a little.
There's something else.
Amy's blood has higher than normal levels of calcium and parathyroid hormone.
I think she has a condition called renal osteodystrophy.
What's that? A disorder that causes severe bone deterioration and eventually death.
Almost always seen in people who have been on dialysis at least 5 years.
So what's keeping her alive is also killing her.
Slowly and painfully.
She's in so much excruciating, constant pain that she might consider suicide.
Crime lab says the print on the syringe plunger is Christina's.
That means Christina injected herself with insulin.
And Amy Solwey definitely brought it to her.
Her print's the one on the cylinder.
Docket ending 414.
People vs.
Amy Solwey.
One count, manslaughter in the second degree.
I see you've hired a new attorney, Miss Solwey.
Barry Moredock for the defense, Your Honor.
How does your client plead? Not guilty.
Bail, Miss Novak? Can we approach? The People believe Miss Solwey is a suicide risk.
Based on what? By the pain caused by her debilitating bone disease.
You want to keep an eye on her? For her own protection.
That's unfair, Your Honor, what my client needs is continued access to her dialysis three days a week Which she'll have in the prison ward of Bellevue Hospital, along with 3 squares a day and indoor plumbing.
Step back.
Defendant is remanded without bail.
Miss Novak, I believe in the Constitution.
I bet you do, too.
You're reaching, Mr.
Moredock.
This case is about murder, not free speech.
I disagree.
So does my client.
Your client handed Christina the weapons she killed herself with.
She didn't force Christina to use it.
The law doesn't make that distinction.
The law in this case is the problem, not what Amy Solwey did.
Your client's not a violent, cold-blooded killer.
We may be open to a deal.
Oh, we're not interested in a deal, Miss Novak.
Amy wants her day in court.
She does or you do? I represent my client's interests, not my own.
Well, then talk to her.
Don't let her spend what time she has left in prison.
You already locked her up, and for no good reason.
I'm sorry, I can't take the chance you're wrong.
Then let your Dr.
Huang evaluate her.
He'll tell you Amy's no more suicidal than you and I.
You have Allport's Syndrome.
So you've been deaf since you were born.
Was it hard growing up that way? No.
My father was deaf so I've never known anything else.
Even the kidney failure didn't bother me because I knew it was coming.
What I wasn't ready for was the pain.
Are you on the list for a kidney transplant? Yeah.
But they haven't found a match for me yet.
The pain is what made me first think about suicide.
Did you talk to a therapist? Three.
They put me on antidepressants, but I told them that didn't change the fact that I was dying of kidney failure.
So I stopped seeing them.
And yet you're still here, so you must have found some way to cope.
I started a blog.
People responded, it turned into my own little community of support.
Is that how catchingthetrain.
com started? Yes.
One day someone wrote that she wanted to kill herself.
She was suffering mentally, not physically.
What did you tell her? To get help, that she should be thankful that she wasn't dying.
She wrote back and asked me who was I to assume that her suffering couldn't be as bad or worse than mine.
How did that make you feel? I realized that I was judging her, just like the shrinks judge me.
So I wrote back and I told her she was right, that I supported her choice.
But you did more than that with Christina Nerrit.
You helped her die.
She could have been helped to want to live.
You believe that suicide's wrong because it's your job to save people.
Medicine and psychiatry are about how to improve the quality of life, not how to end it.
Antidepressants and therapy never worked for me.
I still think about suicide every day.
But something keeps you from doing it.
Those people on the Internet.
Who'd help them if I'm gone? The irony is that her website gives her a reason to live.
Playing God with people's lives? She's like Kevorkian.
Come on, Munch, all the stuff you whine about, don't tell me you haven't once thought about hanging it up.
I believe life's worth living.
Amen.
I don't know.
If I had something like Huntington's Disease and all I had to look forward to was a long, horrible death, I can't say I wouldn't think about suicide.
Moredock will try to stack the jury with people like you.
He's going to put the assisted suicide statute on trial.
Jury nullifies, precedent's set, and the law can be ignored.
Which is exactly what Amy wants, the right to take our own lives.
Amy Solwey isn't depressed or mentally ill, but she is in constant pain.
And she deals with this by spreading the message that suicide is our right.
As a psychiatrist, how would you assess that view? Mainstream medicine and psychiatry wouldn't agree, but Amy wouldn't have a reason to live if she didn't help people die.
What about Christina Nerrit, was she depressed? Based upon interviews I did with her family and co-workers, I'd say yes.
Now, was her disorder treatable? With therapy, medication, and hard work, Christina probably could have led a full, happy life.
Thank you, Doctor.
What if Christina didn't want to go through your therapy, and told you she had a plan to take her own life? What would you have done? Checked her into a psychiatric facility on a 72-hour hold.
You would deprive her of her liberty despite the fact that suicide is not illegal.
The intention isn't to imprison her.
It's to protect her from herself.
successful suicides are committed by people with a treatable mental illness.
And you could cure all of them, isn't that right? I said treatable, not all are curable.
Then sometimes, your medication and therapy just don't work.
In severe cases, yes.
The truth is, Doctor, you can't sit there and say that there is no such thing as a terminal mental illness.
Can you? No.
Christina called me, she was happy.
Said it was time.
I went to her apartment to give her moral support.
She told me she was using the plastic bag and the handcuffs so she couldn't rip it off.
What did you do? Wished her a safe journey and left.
What happened in the hospital? Christina called again, told me she couldn't find any insulin and asked me to bring her some.
I filled a syringe and took it to her.
Amy, did you at any time coerce or convince Christina Nerrit to take her own life? No, it was her decision.
You're sure about that? Yes.
The day she tried to suffocate herself, did Christina tell you that the man she'd had an affair with had just dumped her? I didn't ask.
Did you ever consider that she might be under strain and not thinking rationally? We didn't talk about her boyfriend.
Of course not.
You couldn't assess her mental state because you're not a trained mental health professional.
Objection, argumentative.
Withdrawn.
Do you have criteria? For what? Whom you choose to help on their final journey.
I mean, has it only been adults, or have there been teenagers, children, the developmentally disabled? That's badgering, Your Honor.
I help people who don't want to suffer anymore.
The truth is you don't know who they are, do you? They're just names on a computer screen.
Stop! They're in pain, I know what pain is! I live with it every day, you don't! How can you judge me? How can you judge them? This case isn't just about Amy Solwey helping Christina Nerrit kill herself.
Time and again, the highest court in the land has ruled our government can't tell us what to do with our bodies.
Why should suicide be any different? Miss Novak will tell you it's your duty to uphold the law.
But if you convict Amy Solwey, you're sending a message that the government can dictate how we live our lives and how we end them.
Our Constitutional rights to privacy and free speech are at stake.
Return a verdict of "Not guilty".
Send the message that Amy Solwey is right.
We should all have the choice to live and die on our own terms.
No one has the right to kill another human being.
So why should Amy Solwey be allowed to help Christina Nerrit murder herself? Now, we'll never know Christina Nerrit's pain, but what we do know is that many depressed people who attempt suicide are later thankful they lived through it.
But Christina Nerrit never got the chance to get treatment, or be grateful she was alive because Amy Solwey made it her mission to help Christina die.
So when you're in the jury room, you ask yourselves if your parent, your child, your friend or spouse was suicidal, what would you want? Your loved one to get help, or Amy Solwey telling them it's okay to give up? Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, is there any chance that with more time, you could reach a verdict? No, Your Honor, we're hopelessly deadlocked.
Then I have no choice but to declare a mistrial.
You are dismissed with the thanks of the court.
We're adjourned.
How could they not convict her? The jury deadlocked 10-2.
I underestimated the power of Moredock's argument.
You can't blame yourself because two people wanted to acquit Amy.
The two holdouts were for conviction.
The majority voted to let Amy walk.
Well, just let me know when you need me for the retrial.
There's not going to be a retrial, John.
Why the hell not? Because the DA doesn't want to make Amy Solwey a martyr for assisted suicide.
Translation: We lose, so we're letting her off the hook? We'll we'll get her, it's only a matter of time before she does it again.
So we let her help someone else die.
I don't like it either, John, but I don't have a choice.
Well, that's great, I just can't wait to tell Christina's sister.
Maybe if dying is what Christina really wanted, it's okay.
She never told you she was suicidal, did she? Not once, I could have helped her.
Allison, none of this is your fault.
Why couldn't she have just talked to me? Well, maybe she didn't want to burden you.
But now I'm all alone.
She should have thought about that.
People who commit suicide don't always consider the mess they leave behind.
Or they think people will be better off without them.
She was wrong.
You have every right to be mad at Christina.
I'm not.
I could have stopped her the second time, if I'd listened to the message.
What message? On her answering machine.
The night after she tried to suffocate herself.
I didn't play it till after the funeral.
Do you still have it? Yeah.
Over here.
Sorry you missed the train.
But this time we'll go together.
I'll bring enough to the hospital for both of us.
The lab's got the actual machine.
They made a dub so you could hear it.
Whose voice is that? It's a TTY relay operator.
Solwey's LUDs showed she made the call the night before Christina died.
Then this was a suicide pact.
Pretty one-sided.
I guess Amy changed her mind.
Or lied to Christina to push her over the edge.
I'm going to ask the DA to let us take another crack at Amy.
So what's different now? The charge.
Second degree murder? Is this the way you people retaliate? Simmer down, Mr.
Moredock.
It's not personal.
Sure it is, your District Attorney branch hates losing to me.
You'd better not be wasting my time with politics, Miss Novak.
I'm not, Your Honor.
We can prove Amy Solwey entered into a suicide pact with Christina.
Amy's still alive, so clearly, she had no intention of going through with it.
She just wants my client to plead out to a spurious charge.
Read this statute, when 2 people enter into a suicide pact and one of them pulls out for personal gain after the other one is dead, that's Murder Two.
What could Amy Solwey possibly gain by Christina Nerrit's death? Validation of her cause, which is exactly what she got when that jury deadlocked.
You're not going to let her sell you this bill of goods, are you, Judge? Don't insult my intelligence, Mr.
Moredock.
That's how the law is written.
Unless you can prove Miss Novak wrong, we're going back to trial.
How'd it go? The Grand Jury took 15 minutes to indict.
You okay? Amy Solwey deserves to be put away, but convicting her is not going to change a damn thing.
John, she broke the law.
Okay, Amy goes to prison, someone takes over her website, more people die who don't have to.
Gotta be some way to shut it down.
Maybe not.
I just read about this website where they're teaching young girls to become anorectic and then hide it from their parents.
There is always going to be hate and racism on the Internet.
What are you gonna do about it? Freedom of speech, man.
If someone talks, there's always somebody there to listen.
You look like you could use a drink.
Wish I had time.
I'm headed over to Bellevue, thought you might want to come.
Amy Solwey is refusing dialysis.
When Judge Bradley hears about this stunt, he's gonna blow a gasket.
There's a lot I'd do to win a case, Miss Novak, but I'm on your side here.
Why are you doing this? I would rather die now than in prison.
You mean you'd rather be a martyr, don't you? Stop calling me that.
Or do you finally feel some guilt over tricking Christina Nerrit into your bogus suicide pact? I did not trick her.
I thought by saying I would die with her, it would make her feel more comfortable, feel better about her decision.
Her decision.
If this won't work, I'll get a court order to force the dialysis.
You know full well, no judge will ever issue such an order.
I can still try.
You can't force me to eat, I'll just starve.
I thought you were all about avoiding pain.
When you don't eat, your body releases endorphins as it breaks down its own tissue for fuel.
I'm told it's a very pleasant and painless death.
I'm looking for Casey Novak.
Yes, can I help you? I'm, uh, Dr.
Nemarich, Amy Solwey's nephrologist.
I'm sorry, I can't talk to you.
You may want to contact her defense attorney.
I did, he told me to come see you.
About what? This, just faxed over from UNOS, the National Organ Registry.
They've found her a kidney? We don't have much time.
I'm coming.
I'm coming.
John, what are you doing here? Why the hell didn't you call me? There's nothing anyone can do, Amy's made her choice.
Which is? If we're going to put her in prison, it's a waste of a kidney.
Then plead her out to a lesser charge.
Excuse me? Don't let her do this to herself.
You're the one who wanted me to jump through hoops to retry her.
Why are you so invested in this? Her dying isn't worth it.
If we cave on Amy, it opens the door for any other perp who wants to force a plea by threatening suicide.
I can't jump just because she's got a gun to my head.
She's different.
No, she's not, John.
I'm sorry.
So am I.
Can you read my lips? Yes.
Why won't you take this kidney? My life, my decision.
Yeah, well, it's the wrong decision.
Leave me alone.
Why, so you can die alone in this dump? Get out.
Great way to catch that train, isn't it? I don't want to hurt anymore.
Then let them do the transplant.
No.
It will take away your pain.
So I could go to prison? So you can live.
Why do you care if I live or die? Because my father killed himself.
When I was a kid, I thought it was my fault.
The night before he blew his brains out, he punished me for being a wise-ass.
I told him I hated his guts.
Those were the last words I ever said to him.
It haunts me to this day.
You're the only person I've ever told.
Why me? Because we're the same.
I feel guilty.
My father was suffering, I couldn't help him.
You feel guilty because of what you did to Christina.
I'm sorry.
I'm so sorry.
I know.
I don't want you to die.
Help me help you.
Please.
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.
This apartment's not scheduled until 1:00.
If we get in trouble, I'm blaming you.
We clean the place early, we go home early.
The lady's gonna be pissed if she walks in and we scare the crap out of her.
That's the beauty of it, the lady got a new job.
She'll be gone all day.
How do you know? Janey cleaned this apartment last week.
Eww.
The bathroom is disgusting.
No wonder.
That lazy bitch always does a half-assed job.
Oh, my God! What? Oh, she's dead.
She's dead.
Call the cops.
Just get me an ambulance right now.
Ma'am, ma'am, lady.
Lady, ma'am, ma'am, can you hear me? Ma'am? She's not breathing! Lady, come on, wake up.
Ma'am? Her name is Christina Nerrit.
Unconscious, but EMS said she was breathing on her own the whole way in.
Do we know what made her unconscious? Cleaning woman found her handcuffed with a plastic bag taped over her head.
We don't know how long she was deprived of oxygen.
We're doing an EEG to assess brain activity.
Rape kit? Negative for hairs and fluids.
And the paramedics say her hair was soaked when they found her.
Soon as I know more, I'll call you.
Victim was wet.
Perp must have tried to clean her up.
So much for trace evidence.
ME's office, urgent.
Crime Scene sent urine samples from the toilet in the victim's bathroom.
Even you can't get DNA back that fast.
No, but I ran other tests.
Urine's got high levels of creatinine and blood urea nitrogen, both by-products of protein.
What does that mean? Your victim or your perp is dying of kidney failure.
The neighbor down the hall said the victim was some kind of artist.
How did you guys do? Middle of the day, hardly anyone around.
The maids didn't hear or see squat.
And unfortunately, this building doesn't have security cameras.
So all we've got is a perp who may have kidney failure.
The urine I sent to the ME came from two spots I found on the rim of the bowl.
What makes you so sure it's the perp's? The victim's a woman living alone, the toilet seat was up.
Some guys never learn.
Soap's wet, so your theory that the perp made her take a shower holds water.
I'll check the drain for hairs.
The only thing that doesn't make sense is the bed.
What about it? Guy goes to all this trouble to cover his tracks, leaves the sheets.
Why? Cash and credit cards are still in her wallet along with this receipt from this morning.
Restaurant at the Hotel Kennedy.
$70, had to be at least two people eating.
So Christina buys him breakfast, he rapes her for lunch.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember her.
Breakfast rush, table 10.
She with anyone? Uh, some suit.
You know, custom shirt, $100-tie.
Wish I had the balls to spill something on it.
Bad tipper? The guy takes one bite of his potatoes, spits them out, and starts screaming.
He told me, "No salt.
" He's got a health problem? Yeah, or a mental problem.
I mean, I write everything down.
He never said, "No salt.
" Remember anything else? Uh, the woman seemed a little PMS mood-wise, I bring out the coffee, she's all happy and smiley.
When I come back with the entree, she's bawling like a baby.
About what? I don't stand around eavesdropping.
You didn't happen to hear the guy's name either? No.
No, but I can get it for you.
It's not gonna be there.
She paid for breakfast.
Yeah, but he had a bar tab, a couple of Bloody Marys while he was waiting for her.
Yeah, that's it.
A guy named Brooks Harmon, corporate credit card, Blossner House Publishing.
I'd just hired Christina as Director of Medical Illustration.
Will she be okay? We're waiting to hear from the hospital.
I felt something was wrong when she didn't show up for the staff meeting.
I tried her cell phone but it went right to voicemail.
Did Christina tell you where she was going? Home, to pick up a few things, then she was coming right back here.
Anything bothering her? Not that I know of.
We were celebrating her new position.
Really? Because we heard that she was crying.
Christina is our best freelance illustrator.
She has no management experience.
She was anxious about being able to handle the job.
Do you have a problem handling salt, Mr.
Harmon? No, I just don't like the whole shaker being poured over my breakfast.
What does it have to do with Christina? Can you tell us where you went after the breakfast? Straight back to the office.
You didn't answer my question.
You're the last person seen with Christina before she was attacked.
That makes me a suspect? Not if you don't mind letting our medical examiner take some blood for a DNA sample to rule you out.
No problem.
When? Tomorrow.
We'll, uh, set it up and give you a call.
Any time is fine.
Thanks for the help.
That was Cragen.
He wants us to re-canvass all the tenants who weren't there when we got there.
What, Munch and Fin take a personal day? They're at the hospital.
Christina's awake.
I was opening the door to my apartment when he came up behind me, said he had a gun, told me not to scream.
After you got inside, what did he do? He made me take off my clothes and lie in bed.
He said he'd kill me if I looked at him.
Then he Cuffed me to the headboard and raped me.
What happened next? He put the bag over my head.
Thank God, the maids found me.
Were you ever able to get a look at him? No.
I was too scared.
Christina.
Oh.
My sister, Allison.
These men are police detectives.
Here's your laptop, but I wish you would just get some rest.
No, working will help me forget what happened.
We can give you the names of some counselors.
I'm not talking to any shrinks.
Ahem, I'm sorry.
I didn't mean to snap like that.
L I You're just trying to help.
A couple of big holes in her story.
Christina gets home at 10:00, the maids find her at 11:30.
Meaning she and the perp were alone for hour and half.
That's a long time not to get a look at him.
Doesn't mean she made it up.
She didn't mention takin' a shower.
A rapist makes you clean up, now, that's a hard thing to forget.
Not to mention the fact that he happens to sneak out in the nick of time.
Couldn't have had more than six minutes after he put the bag on her head or she would have asphyxiated.
Anything from the second canvass? Just that that is the only way in or out of that building.
Either no one wants to fess up to letting a stranger in, or they really didn't see him.
Maybe candid camera did.
The store has got one pointing this way.
I cued it back to just before 10:00, like you said, zoomed it in.
Christina, right on time.
Nobody followed her in.
Fast forward it to 11:30.
I don't have to.
I already dubbed the tape.
Hold it.
Look at that.
Brooks Harmon.
He rapes her, but he used a condom.
That's why he gave us the DNA.
So, you went in at 11:10 and you left at 11:30.
What were you doing there, Brooks? I wanted to make sure she was okay.
Why wouldn't she be? Because she never came back to work.
I knocked on her apartment door.
No answer.
So you stayed for 20 minutes, at the same time she happened to be suffocating? I swear I had nothing to do with it.
You called your office to cancel your 11:00 a.
m.
Staff meeting.
That sounds to me like you had some place to go.
Brooks, I'm gonna tell you what I think.
You tried to kill Christina so your wife wouldn't find out you were banging her, hm? Okay.
We were having an affair.
So why didn't you just tell us that? I was trying to end it at breakfast.
That's why Christina was crying.
Are you sure that it wasn't because you told her you wanted to tie her up? What are you talking about? We found your handcuffs, Brooks.
I don't do that.
Toilet seat was up, you do that? What the hell does that mean? It means you sprinkle when you tinkle.
Our medical examiner tested the urine you left behind.
You're dying of kidney failure.
That's impossible, I I just had a physical.
I am in perfect health.
Mr.
Harmon, I'm Capt.
Cragen.
There's been a misunderstanding.
You're free to go.
I can leave? With our apologies.
You people are nuts.
Captain? Warner thinks it's somebody else, I sent Munch and Fin to see her.
I found cervical cells in the urine.
Whoever used the toilet is female.
And it's not Christina? If her kidneys were failing, it would have shown up in her blood-work from the ER.
Christina's labs all came back normal.
So the person with her was a woman.
Christina's a bisexual? Harmon knocks on the door, she doesn't answer because she's with her girlfriend.
She makes Christina take a shower, she cuffs her to the bed and tapes a bag over her head.
But instead of having sex, the bitch leaves Christina to suffocate.
So why is Christina crying rape to protect her? I don't want to talk about it.
She tried to kill you.
It it was an accident.
Doesn't look that way.
She threaten you not to talk? No.
Look, I'm not here to judge you, believe me.
But no matter how much you love this woman, she doesn't deserve your loyalty.
What happened in my apartment was was not a crime.
Falsely reporting a rape is.
I'm really tired, I'd I'd like to go back to my room.
I need you to tell me what really happened.
Don't worry about me.
Are you all right? Yes, I'm okay now.
Whoa, whoa! We need some help here.
I need some help, now.
Help! Stabilize her head.
The medical examiner's on the way.
We're treating Miss Nerrit's death as suspicious.
What happened to her? Severe hypoglycemic shock.
Her blood sugar crashed.
Doctors did a finger stick when they were trying to resuscitate her.
She had a glucose level of two.
That sounds low.
Oh, yeah.
Normal is around 90.
So I ran some tests on blood drawn during the code.
Miss Nerrit's insulin level was five times normal.
Are you saying she was murdered? I can't say anything official yet, of course, but someone injected Miss Nerrit with a massive dose of insulin.
When? No more than 15, 20 minutes before seizures began.
Hospital pharmacy went through their inventory.
All their insulin is accounted for.
Someone brought it in from the outside.
Christina had any visitors besides her sister? Staff didn't notice anyone.
Perp could have been dressed like they work here.
Or the real deal, psycho doc or killer nurse, like that guy in Jersey gets off watching people die.
Either one would have access to insulin.
You'd better be sure about this.
The hospital pathologist said Christina was definitely injected.
I get stuck with a needle and die, and my husband and kids get both your pensions.
Now we just have to find the right syringe.
How are we gonna know? That's the easy part.
Hospitals order one brand in bulk.
This one is different from the others.
Hospital confirms it never used that brand of syringe.
The lab found prints on the cylinder and plunger and traces of insulin.
Injected how? No needle punctures in Christina's body, so it had to be through the port in her IV.
Young, otherwise healthy, about to be discharged.
An angel of mercy usually likes them old and sick.
Hospital hasn't had a suspicious death in years.
We're checking the personnel files just in case.
Could be our mystery woman didn't want to risk Christina ratting her out.
Christina's sister Allison was the last person seen in her hospital room.
The sister have a reason to want Christina dead? She may have killed herself.
Where'd you get that? Computer Crimes just found something very interesting on her laptop.
Gentlemen, uh, your so-called victim has been doing a little blogging.
That's daily, almost hourly visits to one website.
"Catchingthetrain.
Com.
" Catching the train where? Apparently to the afterlife.
It's a bunch of people talking about suicide.
Listen to this: "Welcome to the station, the train's pulling in.
Click here for your ticket to everlasting peace.
" Can you believe that? Christina Nerrit's handle on this site was CU, as in later.
Who was she writing to? Mostly, someone with the screen name Conductor.
That's why she was so hot for a laptop at the hospital.
She wanted to chat with these whackos.
Christina started a thread the day you found her entitled, "Still here".
"Christina: Missed the train today.
Conductor: What happened?" "Christina: Maids came early and found me, ripped the bag off.
I'm in the hospital.
" "Conductor " "What now? "Christina: Something quick before anyone figures it out.
Conductor: Hospitals have insulin.
" The first time Christina tries to off herself, she lives.
She made sure that wouldn't happen again.
We've got plenty of cases with living victims.
We've got to move on if this was a suicide.
Assisted suicide, Captain.
That's second degree manslaughter.
Maybe Christina's mystery girlfriend with kidney failure is our Conductor.
We can ID her off her ISP.
I found where Christina ordered her insulin.
Online prescription mail, Staten Island.
Police.
Stand up, step away from your computers and do not touch anything.
I'm Marvin Friedman, Chairman, CEO.
You can wait outside until our lawyers arrive.
This is a warrant signed by a federal judge allowing us to look for evidence.
Your company dispenses medication without prescriptions.
Everything we do here is legal.
How'd this woman buy insulin from you to kill herself? I don't know.
She probably lied on the questionnaire.
Our doctors won't send anything out to anyone unless they've signed the medical records.
Right, I'm sure you decline any order that may be unnecessary or dangerous.
I don't have to answer that.
I bet these, uh, so-called doctors will, once we threaten to take their licenses.
What do you want from me? Check when that order went out.
It went out overnight two days ago.
You keep all these invoices in your head? She called me, frantic because I wouldn't ship it to her post office box.
Where did she have the insulin sent? Her home address.
I'm packing up Christina's things.
Guess I'll give most of it away.
What are you looking for? Any packages that came after Christina went into the hospital? Um, just this.
You know what's in it? I think it's insulin.
Christina wasn't diabetic.
Allison, we think your sister used insulin to kill herself.
No, that can't be, I mean, it's right here.
She couldn't get it, so someone got it for her.
If Christina committed suicide, then why are the police interested? Because someone helped her and that's a crime.
Did any of Christina's friends have keys to the apartment? Christina didn't have any friends.
Allison, I need to know where you were yesterday.
You think it was me? I have to ask.
You were the last one seen with her in the hospital before she died.
I loved her, I would never help her kill herself.
Sorry to interrupt.
That's okay, we're done.
I'd like to finish packing.
Computer Crimes found our Conductor.
Dr.
Amy Solwey? Just a second.
Uh, these men are police officers.
Can you help us out here? Dets.
Munch and Tutuola.
We need to talk to you in private.
My assistant can translate.
This is official business.
We'll call an interpreter down to our precinct.
Fine.
Just give me a moment.
Should we call you Dr.
Solwey or Conductor? Conductor on the Internet.
In person, my name is Amy.
So, Amy, how do you know Christina Nerrit? I'm sorry.
I don't.
How about CU from the Catchingthetrain website? That's my site.
I know the name.
Did you help Christina Nerrit kill herself? I gave her advice.
Bad advice.
She didn't think so, she was in pain.
And suicide was the cure? What kind of doctor are you? PhD, I'm an embryologist.
So you help women get pregnant and in your spare time you tell them how to kill themselves? By telling them exactly how to do it.
"If you're using cyanide, "mix it with water and test the Ph.
"Make sure it's not too acidic or alkaline so it doesn't burn going down.
" Your website is like Suicide for Dummies.
My website also prevents people from killing themselves.
But it's just talk, you know, free speech.
And where were you two days ago, Amy, around lunchtime? I was at work.
Ask my assistant.
You don't seem too upset about Christina's death.
I'm not.
She's happy now.
I'm sure she called to thank you right after she died.
Christina didn't commit a crime, and neither did I.
Now if that's all, I've got to get back to work.
Thank you.
An officer will drive you.
She's lying.
How do you know that? Her coat, it's Burberry.
I've seen it before.
Where? There, you can't see her face, but that's Amy Solwey leaving Christina's building.
Two minutes after Christina's boss.
He was banging on the door for 15 minutes.
Amy must have waited until after he left so he wouldn't see her.
Probably helped her put on the cuffs and the bag.
The urine on the toilet belonged to a woman.
It's got to be Amy's.
How do you know that? She's probably got Allport's Syndrome.
It's a rare genetic disorder that causes deafness and kidney failure.
Is that enough to collar her? I'd like to connect her to the insulin first.
She works in a doctor's office.
Not all doctors keep insulin around.
Hers would.
It's a fertility clinic, an OBIGYN.
They need it for the pregnant women with the gestational diabetes.
The insulin is stored upstairs.
We have no use for it down here.
The warrant covers the entire office.
Please, you are literally holding potential lives in your hands.
You must know what that's like.
I've got the insulin.
Where'd you find it? Desk in her office.
Amy Solwey, you are under arrest for assisting a suicide.
You have the right to remain silent.
If you give up that right, anything you say can be used against you in a court of law.
You have the right to an attorney.
Man Two is a stretch.
You're wrong about my client.
Any advice Amy gave Christina regarding suicide is protected by the First Amendment.
As deplorable as I find her website, if all she did was exercise her right to free speech, we wouldn't be here.
We can explain those insulin vials in her office.
After they give birth, our gestational diabetes patients sometimes bring their leftover insulin back to the office.
Last week a woman gave me hers.
She got busy, put them in her desk and forgot about them, honest mistake.
Nice try, but the syringe used to inject Christina is the same brand used in your client's office.
And thousands of other doctor's offices, clinics and hospitals.
We have her on tape leaving Christina's building just before she was found.
Is that a coincidence, too? Christina called me, asked me if I could come over, I met her in the hallway.
She told me her plans, I tried to talk her out of it.
Really? Doesn't that go against your whole belief system? You can't possibly understand.
You're right.
We don't.
Why are we debating this? Nobody saw Amy enter Christina's apartment or hospital room.
If she's innocent, give us blood for DNA.
Doctor Huang is right on the money.
Amy Solwey has Allport's Syndrome.
The woman's a scientist, she's got to know we had something on her.
Why agree to a blood test? Probably because she thought she could fool us by giving right after dialysis.
But her kidneys are in such bad shape, the dialysis only helped a little.
There's something else.
Amy's blood has higher than normal levels of calcium and parathyroid hormone.
I think she has a condition called renal osteodystrophy.
What's that? A disorder that causes severe bone deterioration and eventually death.
Almost always seen in people who have been on dialysis at least 5 years.
So what's keeping her alive is also killing her.
Slowly and painfully.
She's in so much excruciating, constant pain that she might consider suicide.
Crime lab says the print on the syringe plunger is Christina's.
That means Christina injected herself with insulin.
And Amy Solwey definitely brought it to her.
Her print's the one on the cylinder.
Docket ending 414.
People vs.
Amy Solwey.
One count, manslaughter in the second degree.
I see you've hired a new attorney, Miss Solwey.
Barry Moredock for the defense, Your Honor.
How does your client plead? Not guilty.
Bail, Miss Novak? Can we approach? The People believe Miss Solwey is a suicide risk.
Based on what? By the pain caused by her debilitating bone disease.
You want to keep an eye on her? For her own protection.
That's unfair, Your Honor, what my client needs is continued access to her dialysis three days a week Which she'll have in the prison ward of Bellevue Hospital, along with 3 squares a day and indoor plumbing.
Step back.
Defendant is remanded without bail.
Miss Novak, I believe in the Constitution.
I bet you do, too.
You're reaching, Mr.
Moredock.
This case is about murder, not free speech.
I disagree.
So does my client.
Your client handed Christina the weapons she killed herself with.
She didn't force Christina to use it.
The law doesn't make that distinction.
The law in this case is the problem, not what Amy Solwey did.
Your client's not a violent, cold-blooded killer.
We may be open to a deal.
Oh, we're not interested in a deal, Miss Novak.
Amy wants her day in court.
She does or you do? I represent my client's interests, not my own.
Well, then talk to her.
Don't let her spend what time she has left in prison.
You already locked her up, and for no good reason.
I'm sorry, I can't take the chance you're wrong.
Then let your Dr.
Huang evaluate her.
He'll tell you Amy's no more suicidal than you and I.
You have Allport's Syndrome.
So you've been deaf since you were born.
Was it hard growing up that way? No.
My father was deaf so I've never known anything else.
Even the kidney failure didn't bother me because I knew it was coming.
What I wasn't ready for was the pain.
Are you on the list for a kidney transplant? Yeah.
But they haven't found a match for me yet.
The pain is what made me first think about suicide.
Did you talk to a therapist? Three.
They put me on antidepressants, but I told them that didn't change the fact that I was dying of kidney failure.
So I stopped seeing them.
And yet you're still here, so you must have found some way to cope.
I started a blog.
People responded, it turned into my own little community of support.
Is that how catchingthetrain.
com started? Yes.
One day someone wrote that she wanted to kill herself.
She was suffering mentally, not physically.
What did you tell her? To get help, that she should be thankful that she wasn't dying.
She wrote back and asked me who was I to assume that her suffering couldn't be as bad or worse than mine.
How did that make you feel? I realized that I was judging her, just like the shrinks judge me.
So I wrote back and I told her she was right, that I supported her choice.
But you did more than that with Christina Nerrit.
You helped her die.
She could have been helped to want to live.
You believe that suicide's wrong because it's your job to save people.
Medicine and psychiatry are about how to improve the quality of life, not how to end it.
Antidepressants and therapy never worked for me.
I still think about suicide every day.
But something keeps you from doing it.
Those people on the Internet.
Who'd help them if I'm gone? The irony is that her website gives her a reason to live.
Playing God with people's lives? She's like Kevorkian.
Come on, Munch, all the stuff you whine about, don't tell me you haven't once thought about hanging it up.
I believe life's worth living.
Amen.
I don't know.
If I had something like Huntington's Disease and all I had to look forward to was a long, horrible death, I can't say I wouldn't think about suicide.
Moredock will try to stack the jury with people like you.
He's going to put the assisted suicide statute on trial.
Jury nullifies, precedent's set, and the law can be ignored.
Which is exactly what Amy wants, the right to take our own lives.
Amy Solwey isn't depressed or mentally ill, but she is in constant pain.
And she deals with this by spreading the message that suicide is our right.
As a psychiatrist, how would you assess that view? Mainstream medicine and psychiatry wouldn't agree, but Amy wouldn't have a reason to live if she didn't help people die.
What about Christina Nerrit, was she depressed? Based upon interviews I did with her family and co-workers, I'd say yes.
Now, was her disorder treatable? With therapy, medication, and hard work, Christina probably could have led a full, happy life.
Thank you, Doctor.
What if Christina didn't want to go through your therapy, and told you she had a plan to take her own life? What would you have done? Checked her into a psychiatric facility on a 72-hour hold.
You would deprive her of her liberty despite the fact that suicide is not illegal.
The intention isn't to imprison her.
It's to protect her from herself.
successful suicides are committed by people with a treatable mental illness.
And you could cure all of them, isn't that right? I said treatable, not all are curable.
Then sometimes, your medication and therapy just don't work.
In severe cases, yes.
The truth is, Doctor, you can't sit there and say that there is no such thing as a terminal mental illness.
Can you? No.
Christina called me, she was happy.
Said it was time.
I went to her apartment to give her moral support.
She told me she was using the plastic bag and the handcuffs so she couldn't rip it off.
What did you do? Wished her a safe journey and left.
What happened in the hospital? Christina called again, told me she couldn't find any insulin and asked me to bring her some.
I filled a syringe and took it to her.
Amy, did you at any time coerce or convince Christina Nerrit to take her own life? No, it was her decision.
You're sure about that? Yes.
The day she tried to suffocate herself, did Christina tell you that the man she'd had an affair with had just dumped her? I didn't ask.
Did you ever consider that she might be under strain and not thinking rationally? We didn't talk about her boyfriend.
Of course not.
You couldn't assess her mental state because you're not a trained mental health professional.
Objection, argumentative.
Withdrawn.
Do you have criteria? For what? Whom you choose to help on their final journey.
I mean, has it only been adults, or have there been teenagers, children, the developmentally disabled? That's badgering, Your Honor.
I help people who don't want to suffer anymore.
The truth is you don't know who they are, do you? They're just names on a computer screen.
Stop! They're in pain, I know what pain is! I live with it every day, you don't! How can you judge me? How can you judge them? This case isn't just about Amy Solwey helping Christina Nerrit kill herself.
Time and again, the highest court in the land has ruled our government can't tell us what to do with our bodies.
Why should suicide be any different? Miss Novak will tell you it's your duty to uphold the law.
But if you convict Amy Solwey, you're sending a message that the government can dictate how we live our lives and how we end them.
Our Constitutional rights to privacy and free speech are at stake.
Return a verdict of "Not guilty".
Send the message that Amy Solwey is right.
We should all have the choice to live and die on our own terms.
No one has the right to kill another human being.
So why should Amy Solwey be allowed to help Christina Nerrit murder herself? Now, we'll never know Christina Nerrit's pain, but what we do know is that many depressed people who attempt suicide are later thankful they lived through it.
But Christina Nerrit never got the chance to get treatment, or be grateful she was alive because Amy Solwey made it her mission to help Christina die.
So when you're in the jury room, you ask yourselves if your parent, your child, your friend or spouse was suicidal, what would you want? Your loved one to get help, or Amy Solwey telling them it's okay to give up? Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, is there any chance that with more time, you could reach a verdict? No, Your Honor, we're hopelessly deadlocked.
Then I have no choice but to declare a mistrial.
You are dismissed with the thanks of the court.
We're adjourned.
How could they not convict her? The jury deadlocked 10-2.
I underestimated the power of Moredock's argument.
You can't blame yourself because two people wanted to acquit Amy.
The two holdouts were for conviction.
The majority voted to let Amy walk.
Well, just let me know when you need me for the retrial.
There's not going to be a retrial, John.
Why the hell not? Because the DA doesn't want to make Amy Solwey a martyr for assisted suicide.
Translation: We lose, so we're letting her off the hook? We'll we'll get her, it's only a matter of time before she does it again.
So we let her help someone else die.
I don't like it either, John, but I don't have a choice.
Well, that's great, I just can't wait to tell Christina's sister.
Maybe if dying is what Christina really wanted, it's okay.
She never told you she was suicidal, did she? Not once, I could have helped her.
Allison, none of this is your fault.
Why couldn't she have just talked to me? Well, maybe she didn't want to burden you.
But now I'm all alone.
She should have thought about that.
People who commit suicide don't always consider the mess they leave behind.
Or they think people will be better off without them.
She was wrong.
You have every right to be mad at Christina.
I'm not.
I could have stopped her the second time, if I'd listened to the message.
What message? On her answering machine.
The night after she tried to suffocate herself.
I didn't play it till after the funeral.
Do you still have it? Yeah.
Over here.
Sorry you missed the train.
But this time we'll go together.
I'll bring enough to the hospital for both of us.
The lab's got the actual machine.
They made a dub so you could hear it.
Whose voice is that? It's a TTY relay operator.
Solwey's LUDs showed she made the call the night before Christina died.
Then this was a suicide pact.
Pretty one-sided.
I guess Amy changed her mind.
Or lied to Christina to push her over the edge.
I'm going to ask the DA to let us take another crack at Amy.
So what's different now? The charge.
Second degree murder? Is this the way you people retaliate? Simmer down, Mr.
Moredock.
It's not personal.
Sure it is, your District Attorney branch hates losing to me.
You'd better not be wasting my time with politics, Miss Novak.
I'm not, Your Honor.
We can prove Amy Solwey entered into a suicide pact with Christina.
Amy's still alive, so clearly, she had no intention of going through with it.
She just wants my client to plead out to a spurious charge.
Read this statute, when 2 people enter into a suicide pact and one of them pulls out for personal gain after the other one is dead, that's Murder Two.
What could Amy Solwey possibly gain by Christina Nerrit's death? Validation of her cause, which is exactly what she got when that jury deadlocked.
You're not going to let her sell you this bill of goods, are you, Judge? Don't insult my intelligence, Mr.
Moredock.
That's how the law is written.
Unless you can prove Miss Novak wrong, we're going back to trial.
How'd it go? The Grand Jury took 15 minutes to indict.
You okay? Amy Solwey deserves to be put away, but convicting her is not going to change a damn thing.
John, she broke the law.
Okay, Amy goes to prison, someone takes over her website, more people die who don't have to.
Gotta be some way to shut it down.
Maybe not.
I just read about this website where they're teaching young girls to become anorectic and then hide it from their parents.
There is always going to be hate and racism on the Internet.
What are you gonna do about it? Freedom of speech, man.
If someone talks, there's always somebody there to listen.
You look like you could use a drink.
Wish I had time.
I'm headed over to Bellevue, thought you might want to come.
Amy Solwey is refusing dialysis.
When Judge Bradley hears about this stunt, he's gonna blow a gasket.
There's a lot I'd do to win a case, Miss Novak, but I'm on your side here.
Why are you doing this? I would rather die now than in prison.
You mean you'd rather be a martyr, don't you? Stop calling me that.
Or do you finally feel some guilt over tricking Christina Nerrit into your bogus suicide pact? I did not trick her.
I thought by saying I would die with her, it would make her feel more comfortable, feel better about her decision.
Her decision.
If this won't work, I'll get a court order to force the dialysis.
You know full well, no judge will ever issue such an order.
I can still try.
You can't force me to eat, I'll just starve.
I thought you were all about avoiding pain.
When you don't eat, your body releases endorphins as it breaks down its own tissue for fuel.
I'm told it's a very pleasant and painless death.
I'm looking for Casey Novak.
Yes, can I help you? I'm, uh, Dr.
Nemarich, Amy Solwey's nephrologist.
I'm sorry, I can't talk to you.
You may want to contact her defense attorney.
I did, he told me to come see you.
About what? This, just faxed over from UNOS, the National Organ Registry.
They've found her a kidney? We don't have much time.
I'm coming.
I'm coming.
John, what are you doing here? Why the hell didn't you call me? There's nothing anyone can do, Amy's made her choice.
Which is? If we're going to put her in prison, it's a waste of a kidney.
Then plead her out to a lesser charge.
Excuse me? Don't let her do this to herself.
You're the one who wanted me to jump through hoops to retry her.
Why are you so invested in this? Her dying isn't worth it.
If we cave on Amy, it opens the door for any other perp who wants to force a plea by threatening suicide.
I can't jump just because she's got a gun to my head.
She's different.
No, she's not, John.
I'm sorry.
So am I.
Can you read my lips? Yes.
Why won't you take this kidney? My life, my decision.
Yeah, well, it's the wrong decision.
Leave me alone.
Why, so you can die alone in this dump? Get out.
Great way to catch that train, isn't it? I don't want to hurt anymore.
Then let them do the transplant.
No.
It will take away your pain.
So I could go to prison? So you can live.
Why do you care if I live or die? Because my father killed himself.
When I was a kid, I thought it was my fault.
The night before he blew his brains out, he punished me for being a wise-ass.
I told him I hated his guts.
Those were the last words I ever said to him.
It haunts me to this day.
You're the only person I've ever told.
Why me? Because we're the same.
I feel guilty.
My father was suffering, I couldn't help him.
You feel guilty because of what you did to Christina.
I'm sorry.
I'm so sorry.
I know.
I don't want you to die.
Help me help you.
Please.