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Hey, I tuned it also. I like the thematic elements you mentioned but I did feel the execution was very sloppy. L&O has a habit of setting up straw men and knocking them down with preachy monolouges (the characters seldom, after 14 long years, actually speak with each other anymore, they do speak at each other).

Between that and the the fact that almost every character sounds the same - regardless of their political position, the voices all are identical - vitriolic, arrogant, and obnoxious.

Also, anyone notice what I call the 'Silk Stalkings' effect? That is, the L&O family of shows (and CSI for that matter) resemble more and more that old soft-core late night USA Network police drama, 'Silk Stalkings!' What, the murder was plotted by twin sister playboy playmates in an effort to get the insurance monet? Bum-Bum Bum-Bum (Silk Stalkings music inserted here!)

Can I ask how the episode ended? I got a call that lasted over an hour and my tivo's buffer expired. What was the verdict on the Priest?

Just when the trial seemed to be going the prosecution's way (or not, if the jury was upset with the Prosecutor denegrating 'faith'), the man who's gun the Priest used came to the prosecutors and confessed he had doen the deed. The Priest comes into the room just at that moment and asserts he is definitely the one who is guilty, not the other man. [We have learned at that point that the wife of the other man has let it out that even she knew the Priest killed the dealer.] The prosecutor realizes he doesn't have a sure thing for conviction (jury nullification getting more possible as he attacks faith of the sacrificial Priest), so he implies he would try the other man ... the Priest accepts a plea bargain for 8 to 25.

To soften the prosecutor's character representation, the writers added a scene at the end where the prosecutor tells of the suicide death of a Vietnam injured friend and his complicity in allowing the suicide at the time, and his feelings that he did the right thing in allowing his friend to take his life.