Photo: Michael Parmelee / NBC
'Lacey' Achieves Internet Fame, But Not The Good Kind, Like You Want
A child neglect case is just the horrible outer peel of a grotesque abuse...uh, onion?
First responders are called to the scene when preschooler Maddie finds herself standing on a table on the balcony of her apartment; she's been alone for several "sleeps," as she puts it, and the SVU detectives soon discover the reason: her mother, Jenny, has been arrested for trying to shoplift an American Girl doll for Maddie's birthday.
The reason Jenny didn't actually arrange for Maddie's stepfather Gary to stay with Maddie when Jenny went out (though that's what she'd claimed when she was confronted with charges of having neglected Maddie by leaving her alone in the apartment) that she doesn't trust him to spend any time alone with Maddie: he has "needs," and if Jenny doesn't satisfy them, she says, he'll fulfill them with whomever may be at hand. Because of this, and because it's a sure way to get him to stop hitting and yelling at her, Jenny submits to all of Gary's unwanted sexual advances (in other words: his commissions of marital rape).
The reason Jenny is so scared of upsetting every man she meets, and makes sexual advances toward them when she thinks they're angry, is that she was not just sexually abused as a child, but photographed and filmed during her abuse: as "Lacey," she's been one of the most frequently downloaded child abuse victims on the internet, and though the FBI tried to find her for ten years, the agents involved finally assumed they wouldn't because there's no way she could have survived the childhood they saw documented.
A lot of the details in the Maddie segment of the episode recall this story. UPDATE: the rest seems to be based on Amy Unknown.
That child was a boy; there was no evidence of sexual abuse of his mother; spoiler alert: she didn't regain custody.
"That's the thing about those crazy chicks -- which is just what my brother said when he gave her to me."
Against his specific advice, Liv brings Jenny to be evaluated by Dr. Lindstrom, Liv's own therapist.
When it becomes clear that he's been getting away with raping Jenny because he thinks their being married means anything goes, Amaro says they need to go arrest him or else let him beat the guy up. (Which: that guy has about 100 pounds on him, so, I'd almost like to see him try?)
Non-verbally, anyway. When Fin and Amaro go meet Jenny's gross mother Tammy to try to get an idea of what kind of fucked-up shit happened to Jenny during her childhood. Tammy offers them a cigarette, and when they refuse, she tells Fin, "You probably like menthols, right? I don't have any Kools." Fin:
Jenny gets the chance to go to court and face one of the men who downloaded her photos to tell him that he broke her life, basically; he gets convicted and has to pay her $20,000 in restitution. But THEN, there's this whole other complicated thing where the FBI has been going after as many people (guys) as they can who've downloaded "Lacey" photos and videos, and it looks like she's going to have to go testify against...this many perverts.
But then Barba figures out that they can calculate the total amount of restitution Jenny would be entitled to and, under "joint and several liability," get the whole amount just from one rich guy. The dude writes a check (for some $4 million), and Jenny gets Maddie back.
Cassidy breaks up with Liv because she won't open up to him about her whole Lewis ordeal (remember Lewis? You will, he's back next week); they exchange "I love you"s but I guess that's it for them, at least until this gets cancelled.