TV's Law & Order Cracks Down on White Men

Toogood Reports ^ | 29 December 2002 | Nicholas Stix

[mrustow]

Toogood Reports [Christmas Weekender, December 29, 2002; 12:01 a.m. EST]
URL: http://ToogoodReports.com/

My previous column detailed a number of network TV series' campaign to demonize white men and romanticize black men, in the depiction of crime. But without a doubt, TV's champion white-baiter is persistent felony offender Dick Wolf, the producer of Law & Order, two Law & Order Lite spin-offs, and a pseudo-documentary crime show. This column has previously detailed a fraction of Wolf's offenses against decency and verisimilitude, and will no doubt return to him; criminals are creatures of habit, and Wolf has a long-term contract with NBC through the 2004-2005 season.

In one episode this season, Wolf re-created the May 10, 2001, execution-style, Carnegie Deli Murders ("Tragedy on Rye"). In the real case, Sean Salley and Andre Smith robbed genteel drug dealer Jennifer Stahl, who lived in an apartment above Midtown Manhattan's Carnegie Deli, and murdered Stahl, Stephen King, and Charles Helliwell. Salley and Smith also shot Rosemond Dane and Anthony Veader, both of whom survived. In June, Salley and Smith were convicted on multiple counts of murder, robbery, and weapons charges; in July, they were both sentenced to 120 years to life.

In the L & O version, the black suspects who were slated to be up for the death penalty for the killings, turned out to be innocent. The killer was white. This episode, written by William N. Fordes, was set up to be an object lesson on the dangers of racial profiling, via the "conscience" of the character of black NYPD "Lt. Joyce Van Buren" (S. Epatha Merkerson), but was actually a shameless exercise in propaganda: The real Carnegie Deli killers WERE black men!

Taking real crimes committed by blacks, and giving them the "ripped from the headlines" treatment, but with the killers' races changed to white, is a Dick Wolf trademark.

In the recent episode, "Open Season," a William Kunstler-like criminal defense attorney gets a black man acquitted, who was guilty as hell of shooting a white police officer, and is murdered — the lawyer, that is — as he is celebrating the acquittal. The killer is a white supremacist, who conspires with other supremacists to murder defense attorneys notorious for handling such cases.

This episode's story line resided entirely in the fantasy world of Dick Wolf and writer Richard Sweren.

One secondary aspect of this episode was, however, based on a true case. At one point, the jailed white supremacist, who has been forbidden from all contact with the outside world, except for his defense attorney (Tovah Feldshuh), uses her as an unwitting conduit to pass along the address of someone he has targeted for murder to an associate, who carries out the killing. However, Dick Wolf's creative team made a slight adjustment in the story. The subplot was based not on a white supremacist, but on the case of radical attorney, Lynne Stewart. Stewart has been arrested and charged with deliberately passing along instructions from one of her clients, Islamic terrorist Sheik Abdul Rahman, who was convicted of masterminding the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, to his confederates. Stewart was taped laughing about what she was doing.

In the interests of full disclosure, I should note that on occasion, Wolf crosses over, and abuses white women, too.

In an episode created last season by writers Terri Kopp, Aaron Zelman, and Eric Overmyer, and re-run on December 4, Myth of Fingerprints, the forensics chief from hell (Diana Scarwid), is caught after having spent years falsely testifying against innocent men (even white men!), all of whom were convicted based on her perjured testimony. Eventually, she is convicted of manslaughter, based on the prison murder of one of the men whom she'd framed.

That episode was based on the very real case of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma forensics chemist, Joyce Gilchrist, who was caught having falsified evidence for years. Based on Gilchrist's testimony, 23 men have been sentenced to death, and eleven have been executed. Unlike the fictional forensics boss on Law & Order, however, Joyce Gilchrist is black.

Dick Wolf and his creative team apparently see TV drama as an opportunity to create non-stop propaganda, and get paid handsomely for it.

[mrustow]

Here's what I seem to recall; you tell me if I have the wrong episode/story line. The killer was a white guy from the deli (owner?) who had a special, reserved parking spot at the racetrack. The cops pinched a couple of black guys when they parked their (SUV?) in the spot. They told the cops that the guy let them use his spot (and they were telling the truth). I vaguely recall a big black guy on a couch, but not where he fits in the story.

[mrustow]

But it doesn't change the fact that it's FICTION and not news.

It changes everything, when a prodcuer claims to be giving dramatic recreations of real crimes. NYPD Blue makes no such claims. The West Wing makes no such claims. L&O does.

[VetsRule]

You've got the right episode, but the wrong details.

The racetrack spot was reserved for a rich black guy who was probably dealing drugs. They pinched him and his two buddies, all of whom were caught on video taking video equipment and a plasma TV out of the dead woman's apartment. It turns out they were collecting on a debt, and she was alive when they left, although they were almost executed because no one believed them.

The white deli owner just gave the cops some leads, there was no other real connection. There were also two white tourists who took the videotape, but they weren't really involved except for selling the tape to a TV station. (The cops convinced the TV station to wait a day before airing the video.)

After Southerlyn moralized to McCoy, he poked into the cell phone records and matched up another phone call from the huge black guy. That's when they looked into his record and saw he had a gun conviction (IIRC) of the same type that killed the girl. The police busted in and booked the perp, who was the real murderer. The three convicted guys from the racetrack were released.

VR

[LdSentinal]

"Ripped From the Headlines"

BTW, when was the last time the guilty person was a black in an episode? At the beginning, many of the criminals were minorities. In recent years, the vast majority of the criminals are white.

[jjm2111]

You complaining?

Not really.

[jjm2111]

But if Tovah had never had ANY help, and I were single and had the opportunity, I still wouldn't throw her out of bed for eating crackers.

I'm single but I wouldn't go anywhere near Tovah. Way too old. :) (She's over thirty years older than me.)

[jjm2111]

Someone once said that if aliens were monitoring our TV emissions they would think that judgeships were the sole propriety of black women.

[Main Street]

Is this one of their Politically Correct anti-white male advertisers?

http://www.ca.com/media/020116_brightstor_amnesia.ram

[mrustow]

"Ripped From the Headlines"

BTW, when was the last time the guilty person was a black in an episode? At the beginning, many of the criminals were minorities. In recent years, the vast majority of the criminals are white.

There is an inverse relationship between the reality of black criminality, and its depiction on TV. According to leftwing groups like the Washington D.C., Sentencing Project, the percentage of black men between 220 and 30 years of age who are either in prison, on parole or probation, went up 33% (from 25% to 33%) between 1990 and 2000, yet the depiction of black men by the TV news and dramas steadily dropped during the same period.

[mrustow]

Sorry, but my computer's messed up, and I can't use a/v programs, until I get a new sound card.

[Main Street]

Sorry. Try this link.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43512-2002Dec27.html

It's the video advertisement to the right of the story.
They would have NEVER done this with the races reversed.

[Sonny M]

I'm pretty sure Goren isn't pro-life. I remember an episode where his partner asked him point blank, and he gave some vauge answer about he doesn't like it personally, but sometimes its nesessary and he understands that it has to be there. (Sort of like the mario cuomo answer). I do remember the first law and orders, Greevy was a solid pro-lifer who was also socially conservative on other issues too. Ben Stone came across as somone who was pro-life but had to do his job. The thing that got alot of african americans riled up on criminal intent was 2 episodes, one Goren basically insults Carver when Carver forced him to use force to get somone (it was ripped from the headlines episode about pardons) and another episode where Goren lies to Carver and makes him look bad (don't know which episode that was). On another note, you ever notice how when its a political thing involving real life dems, they change it to republicans? Example would be the pardons, were done by Clinton, in the episode it was changed to the NYS governor. They also had one where the politician kills somone (they made him a conservative) and gets off.

[Sonny M]

Isn't Duke being prosecuted now or something. I remember when he was making a wannabe run for the presidency, some of his former KKK buddies came out and said point blank, that he never quit, he was thrown out of the Klan because he was stealing membership rosters and selling them, that he was always looking for opputunities to make money off of them. These guys were hardcore racists to boot, they basically made some comparisions to him and jewish people and some crap about conspiracies. "You put him in any office, and he'll be opening a store the next day"

[mrustow]

They have several revolving ads for Accenture, computer associates, and Strayer U. I have a feeling that you saw yet a fourth ad.

[mrustow]

As much as I like Jerry Ohrbach, my favorite character on L&O remains the original protagonist, Det. Max McGreevey, as played by George Dzundza. Do you know why Dzundza left the show after only one season? I thought it was because he had a fantasy he could become a movie star, and so Dick Wolf killed him off, but I could be wrong. (Dzundza then co-starred with Demi Moore -- who was then on her way up -- in a total flopperoo fantasy called The Butcher's Wife.)

[Bogolyubski]

I think the Feds are considering some sort of action because of his speech to a bunch of Islamists in Qatar or some such place. The topic of the speech was quite predictable: (it's all the Jews' fault, no Jews were in the WTC that day, etc.) I don't see that they'd have that much of a case in light of how many leftist whack-jobs are over in Iraq rooting for Saddam, though. Duke is both traitor and flim-flam man - what a lovely combination!

[mrustow]

Found this at a L&O fan site:

3.4 WHATEVER HAPPENED TO... [WARNING!! SPOILER-HEAVY SECTION]

3.4.1 ...George Dzundza (Sgt. Max Greevey)? George Dzundza quit the show after its first season over a dispute with the writers and producers over scheduling and script quality. The series was originally set to film in Los Angeles, but when Dick Wolf won his fight to shoot it in New York, Dzundza did not want to relocate his family there, and thus had to divide his time between the two locations. This argument reached a breaking point when the producers threatened to sue him if Dzundza interrupted shooting to be with his wife at the birth of their child. Dzundza's actual last appearance is in "The Blue Wall," though his character, Greevey, makes a shadowy appearance in the second season opener, "Confession" through the magic of doubles.

Sgt. Max Greevey's first appearance was in "Prescription for Death." In his final episode, he was shot to death in the second season opener, "Confession," by Daniel Madigan, Jr., who wanted to silence his grand jury testimony on construction industry corruption.

[Sonny M]

Do you know which Law and Order site that was, and can you get me the address or link?

[Rainbow Rising]

Thanks for the link to the other article. Interesting reading.

Law & Order's forays into PC Land annoy me so much because it is such a good show otherwise. When they concentrate solely on telling a good crime story, they create top-drawer entertainment. Story should come first and foremost, and to hell with political grandstanding.