Directed by Rick Wallace
Chad’s Role : Eric Keller
Sipowicz meets with Haywood who has had an old case that was recently reopened dumped upon her. The case against Leonard Peeler has been reopened since the testimony of Earl Bezdek, a man who’s found God and is dying of AIDS, has been recanted. This allowed DNA testing to occur that exonerates Peeler. Sipowicz tells her that the case (we later learn his first as a detective) was a good arrest 18 years ago. She asks him to be prepared to offer his assistance if the case does get officially reopened. Sipowicz leaves to join the other detectives on the scene of a homicide where a body was found by a cigarette smoking nursing student who can’t handle dead bodies.
Gibson introduces a new detective to the squad, Det. Kelly Ronson; she comes from narcotics and is pursuing a law degree in the evening. A woman, Alyssa Huber, comes into the squad looking for help to find her missing baby, who’s been missing for maybe a couple of years. She left her daughter in the care of a woman while she was serving jail time and having recently got out she wants her daughter back. She provides the detectives with the last known address of the woman. Clark and Sipowicz interview the brother and mother of victim Gary Keller. The brother Hugh tells the detectives that his brother was here in New York to help get Eric, their drug addicted brother, to come back home to Florida. The interview and additional information uncovered by Medavoy and Jones enlightens them as to how screwed up the Keller family really is. Sipowicz leaves them to follow up on the case while he goes to see his old partner Joe Brockhurst (from 1986) to talk with him about their old case being possibly reopened and retried. Brockhurst doesn’t believe in the hocus pocus of DNA evidence; he prefers to just remember that Peeler was convicted by a jury of the crime. Sipowicz leaves realizing that Brockhurst isn’t going to be much help.
Ortiz and Ronson start to get to know each other as they go to interview the woman that was supposed to have been caring for Alyssa Huber’s daughter. She tells them that the girl was abandoned to her and that she wasn’t able to care for another child on top of the three she already had, as a result she gave the child up to Huber’s cousin. At Eric Keller’s building Clark and Sipowicz come across a bounty hunter, Roy Wingate, whose looking to extricate Eric Keller back to Florida. Wingate tells them about his encounter with Gary and Eric Keller earlier that morning. He doesn’t know anything about the death of Gary Keller. Medavoy and Jones talk again with Hugh Keller, who they enquire about his lack of giving them information about the bounty hunter. Ortiz and Ronson run their case for Gibson, they’ve been following a trail of people whom the little girl has been passed off to, but they haven’t found the girl but they are looking for the woman who was last known to have had custody of the girl. Ortiz and Ronson reinterview Alyssa Huber, about the holes in story. They try to press her to see if her baby is dead and that perhaps she is trying to pull a welfare scam. At Riker’s Sipowicz goes to talk Bezdek, but Bezdek doesn’t give him anything useful, he merely reiterates the story that Haywood has already given him. With the compelling DNA evidence Haywood is given only three days to make her case for upholding the conviction. As the defendant leaves he catches sight of Sipowicz in the court room.
Ortiz and Ronson interview a woman with a cocaine habit and in need of a fix who eventually tells the detectives that she passed the girl off to a woman named Gloria who was working at a soup kitchen two years ago. The parents of the victim in Sipowicz’s old case come to the squad to find out what happened in court today. They want answers and Sipowicz tells them there is always the possibility of a as yet unknown accomplice in the case; he promises them that he will get to the bottom of the case. Ortiz and Ronson go to the home of Gloria Dawson, the woman from the soup kitchen. They find her there with a very happy little 4-year-old girl. Ronson tells her that while she probably knows why they are there, the only thing they are looking to do at the moment is to confirm the condition of the child. The woman confirms the soup kitchen story, and tells them that getting Emily in their lives was a blessing for her and her husband, since the adoption process wasn’t working out in their favor. Clark and Jones interview Eric Keller. Keller tells them about the fire escape that his dead brother Gary helped him use it to escape the bounty hunter. He liked his brother Gary but doesn’t care for his other brother Hugh. Eric tells him he never saw his brother or the bounty hunter again. Back at Riker’s Sipowicz tries to talk Peeler, who isn’t offering him any help since he believes that Sipowicz didn’t believe him back then or now. All he knows for sure right now is that the DNA evidence is going to set him free of a crime he didn’t commit.
Ortiz and Ronson tell Alyssa Huber that her daughter died a year ago in Ohio. They further tell her that their boss wants them to press charges against her for contributing to the death of her child. They offer her the chance to leave now and never come back. She calls them both useless when they won’t call social services on her behalf and get her some death benefits. Clark and Jones interview the bounty hunter, who they have reason to believe is responsible for Gary Keller’s death. They ask him about his use of a stun gun as Keller reportedly died from a heart attack after getting hit with the stun gun five times. One or two times might have been okay, but five times is criminally negligent homicide. Ortiz and Ronson report to Gibson that the little girl is still missing, as they go Ortiz apologizes to her for having her enter into “a secret ‘til death pact” on her first day, but they both agree they did the right thing. Outside his apartment Sipowicz talks with Clark about the old case. He tells Clark that one of the reasons that Peeler’s timeline fell apart was because his old partner got Peeler to estimate a time at one point in their investigation. That time stuck and other witness’s stories didn’t corroborate. Sipowicz was a rookie detective and his partner was a legend. Sipowicz knows now that Peeler didn’t do it and it bothers him so much that his hands are shaking. Clark tells him it wasn’t his fault and he parts company with Sipowicz, with Sipowicz saying he is going for a walk.
Chad Lindberg Fans 