Law & Order: Special Victims Unit quotes

Tell me that doesn't piss you off. We finally catch this prick, and they tell us that we wasted our time?

Marks was one of my first cases at SVU, and he still... he still ranks on my top ten despicable list.

Makes him a lot scummier than I thought.

Yeah, and he was one of the first stops in this investigation, and I... I knock on his door, and... and he invites me in, and he makes me feel, like, completely at home.

Yeah, with the fake charm and the...

No, but see, that's it. It's not fake. It's real. I mean, he really is that charming. You know, he was so charming, I could have invited him back to meet mom and dad after a high school dance. Yeah, I could have been one of those women. I got a badge and gun. And still, that bastard changed the way I look at the world.

An oh-fer. We'd have better luck starting the Byron Marks fan club.

Benson

Well, look, it's upsetting, but it's not surprising.

Yeah, I tried to explain that to him.

Look, I know. I'm sorry. It's just I'm Italian. Revenge is one of our three major food groups.

What's up?

It's my dog walker. Franny just peed on my new shag carpet.

Fin

That dog pees more than my diabetic granddaddy.

You got a granddaddy that's still alive?

Fin

Grandpa Iggy Tutuola. 95, healthy as a horse.

Except for the diabetes.

Fin

Where I'm from, diabetes is like a head cold.

[about Savannah] She's behind on all her bills. Most of these credit card statements are final notices.

Fin

That's what your twenties are for. Racking up credit debt.

Not me, I never paid a bill late in my life. Not even then.

Fin

What? You couldn't handle all the Hail Marys?

God nothing to do with it. I wanted to finance a Mustang.

Look at me. What do you see? A little bit of Brad Pitt's younger brother, right? Around the eyes?

Yeah, if I had one too many and the lights were out.

Just feel so alone, you know?

Benson

What about family? What about your parents?

What about them? Look at me. Exhibit A, all the wonders of the New York City foster care system in all its glory. Fourteen years living in other people's houses, sleeping in other people's beds... you know what you pray for most? A new lightbulb. It's crazy, right? But the other one kept burning out because I was too scared to shut it off.

Benson

I'm so sorry.

You know what's worse than being scared? Being pitied. Yeah, I should have told you that I already reported it to other cops. What's the point? People like you don't believe people like me.

Benson

Tracy Montgomery was a cashier who worked at a Chevron station at a minimart. She claimed she was raped at gunpoint by three guys in the storage closet.

Fin

Only the cash register receipts showed she made six sales during the time of that attack.

Benson

So I could have blown it off and I probably should have blown it off, but the bottom line is the truth of what her two cousins were doing to her from the time she was three years old, was far worse than anything she could have made up. Sometimes girls like Tracy, girls like Savannah, need to make up fairy tales just to get through the day.

[about Karr] I don't know him.

Sonny

Then why was he in your hotel room?

And why did he leave that room minus his balls?

Benson

Given the nature of the injury, there's a sexual motivation behind all of this.

Explains why Karr won't talk.

I can't prosecute the assault unless the victim makes an ID.

Sonny

OK, well how about we charge the three women with obstruction?

For asserting their Fifth Amendment rights?

Sonny

After they lied to us and obfuscated our investigation.

[smirks] "Obfuscate"? Yummy.

You don't understand. You're a man.

Sonny

Listen to me, Evelyn. That man is a predator and he should be in prison.

Yeah, what do you know about it?

Sonny

You're right. I don't know, but I do have a niece. If I found out one of her teachers was doing that to her, cop or no cop, I would beat the living crap out of him.

Listen, I'm considering offering a deal. Karr does the same four years Evelyn Bundy agreed to.

Benson

You proved forcible rape.

If she cut off his finger, if she poked him in the eye...

Benson

It shouldn't make a difference.

We don't live in a vacuum. I can assure you, the seven guys on that jury, they feel Karr's pain.

Benson

And if Karr wasn't castrated, if he had cancer...

It's not the same thing.

Benson

But it should be. Why do we do this, Rafael? Because the next girl who gets raped needs to know that that person is us. No matter what.

Hasn't he suffered enough? [pause] I say he has. Jason assaulted Evelyn, Evelyn assaulted him back. That sounds fair to me. Sounds like justice at work. To be just, it has to be fair. I mean, that's what Ms. Rivers asserts. You know, I can't really disagree with that. In purely pound of flesh terms, Mr. Karr certainly gave up a hell of a lot more than he got. Fair? Not a chance. To be totally fair, you should give Jason one of Evelyn's breasts. An arm, maybe. That's only fair. And as we have now decided, that means it's just. Jason Karr forcibly raped Evelyn Bundy when she was little more than a child, but to tack a prison sentence on Mr. Karr's already gargantuan suffering would tip the balance of justice in Ms. Bundy's favor, and hey, there's no way that's fair, so there's no way that's just. A man whose store burns down rushes out, buys some gasoline, a book of matches and sets the house of the arsonist on fire. Hey! It's fair, so that means it's just! A man whose children have been murdered buys a gun and splatters the brains of the killer's children all over their bedroom walls. It's fair. It's just. Why bother with cops or courts? If it's fair, it has to be just! Let the blood flow in the streets, I say! Oh, wait, you don't like it? I say get a bigger pair of boots.

So one of these boys is guilty. It's like playing three card monte.

Benson

Yeah.

Who has the most to lose?

Benson

I'd say the kid who took the picture of a half-naked 15-year-old girl and texted them to everyone in the school.

You know, it might feel good to take control. You know, you can keep a promise to yourself that if it does get bad, you could always do something about it.

You don't know how I feel.

I know more than you think. You know I told you my name was Amanda, too. Well, when I was your age, I lived in a tiny town in Georgia and everybody gossiped. And I did something stupid and I got a reputation. And it's all I thought about, the names that they were calling me: "Easy Ass Amanda" and worse. It took a long time and I realized what other people said about me, it didn't define me. Only I can define me. And when I was old enough, I went and got this. [shows her a tattoo that has her name on on it] It's my name, Amanda. Just to remind myself that's who I am, not any of these other names that I was branded with.

Benson

Teenagers have always been cruel, but when did they become cowards?

Since the invention of the Internet.

Benson

What kind of world are our kids going to grow up in?

Whatever we think we're gonna have to worry about, it's not gonna be that. It's gonna be something we never saw coming.