Original subtitles

In the criminal justice system,

the people are represented

by two separate, yet equally important groups:

the police, who investigate crime,

and the district attorneys, who prosecute the offenders.

These are their stories.

It's okay.

I got you, I got you.

I'm sorry?

I'm sorry.

I don't speak any type of-- - Oh, help me!

Oh, that's the plan, love. Come on.

What's your name? - Nadiya.

Nadiya, Nadiya.

Said she walked in?

20 minutes ago. Won't say what happened.

She'll only give us her first name, Nadiya.

She's Russian.

A Ukrainian.

She allowed a cursory eval.

We found vaginal trauma. It looks like sexual assault.

We're hoping you can get her to talk.

- Okay. - Nadiya, we're here again.

Attention all units,

be on the lookout for a white female,

20s, Nadiya Doe.

Gray sweats, tennis shoes.

Fled Mercy Hospital, believed on foot,

requires medical attention.

That's just a few blocks away, right?

It's spam.

Wife and I joined this new gym.

Ever since, we keep getting peppered with ads

for longevity supplements and testosterone boosters

for men of a certain age.

And you qualify?

Apparently.

Hey, I think that's the Nadiya Doe.

Nadiya?

Nadiya, right?

Nadiya?

Okay. It's okay.

It's okay, it's okay. We're gonna get you some help.

Central, 2-7, we made contact with Nadiya Doe,

the BOLO from the ER. Hey, Nadiya.

Why don't you come take a seat in our car, okay?

Come get warm.

You're safe, okay? It's safe now.

All right? Nadiya?

Look, I promise.

Shots fired! Shots fired! 10-52, 10-75!

I need a bus and all available units to 28th and Lex.

You got it? - Yeah. Go, go, go!

Move, move, move, move, move!

Get out of the way!

Look out!

I got a black SUV westbound on 31, Jersey plates.

Alfa, Romeo, George, 2-6-4.

Jess.

The hell happened?

God, you have so much blood. Here.

It's okay, it's okay. Don't worry about it.

Um, one shot to the head from distance.

She saw the perp. She knew the guy, no doubt.

Did you get a physical on the shooter?

No. He was in the passenger seat, masked up, gloved up.

Same thing as the driver. We have no identifiers at all.

Did you find anything on the body?

Yeah. Uh, this is some kind of prayer card.

Found it in the pocket of her sweats.

Tymchenko.

I'm gonna get this to Fin.

He's got some free time on his hands.

I'm coordinating with Riley and Walker

trying to find this prick.

And I'll head to the ER, see what they missed

before Nadiya made a run for it.

This was at 11:36 a.m.

That's the guy.

Okay, and it was after you told Nadiya

that her brother was here.

- Then she took off. Right. - Okay.

You think there's some connection?

He seemed like a super nice guy.

Yeah, maybe not so much.

Uh, can you go back to when he first walks in?

See if you can get us an image of him

before he puts his mask on, whatever's clear.

There you are.

All right, did he, uh, did he show an ID when he came in?

No.

Okay, so we don't have a name.

But you got a face?

Yeah. And that's not nothing.

Hey, I got a decent image of the perp.

I'm gonna send it on over. Where are we on the vehicle?

All right, guys, listen up.

We got video of the SUV entering this parking garage

seven minutes ago and there's no indication our guy left.

This is the guy we're looking for--

white male, 40s, average build.

Yeah, he killed someone in broad daylight

and did not hesitate to shoot at me, so let's be ready, okay?

Let's go.

Ma'am! Ma'am! - What?

Come on, come on, come on. - Get downstairs.

All right, here we go.

Smoke! Get back! Get back!

Get back!

Hey.

A&E says the fire was started with a flare,

intentionally, obviously, and that any potential DNA evidence

in that vehicle is gone.

ESU is scouring cameras in the area.

No dice so far.

And these two had direct access

to Penn Station from the garage.

Yep, two minutes after parking.

They could be on the subway, Amtrak,

Jersey Transit, you name it.

What about the plates on the SUV?

Stolen.

Well, you two are full of good news.

You know, my phone's ringing off the hook.

This woman was shot in broad daylight.

The brass wants answers, and we're circling the drain.

Autopsy's in.

So Nadiya Doe was not the victim of a sexual assault?

She was not.

The nurse at the ER said she was.

She got it wrong.

Nadiya was recently pregnant.

Like, within days.

What about her trauma? Her wounds?

They were caused by medical forceps used crudely.

So what are you saying? What--was there a delivery?

And there's a baby out there somewhere?

It's possible.

I need to do more tests to try to figure that out.

But yeah, it's possible.

- Hey. - What's up?

Benson had me look into the prayer card

found on the victim, Nadiya Tecun.

That's Nadiya's real name, Nadiya Tecun.

- All right. - Okay?

The name on the prayer card is Tymchenko.

He's a priest.

He presides over Nadiya's church back in Ukraine.

You get in touch with him?

Yeah, I just talked to him on the phone.

He said Nadiya flew out here about two months ago.

He say why?

No, but he said she came by herself.

Okay, so we can run it against passenger manifests,

figure out when and how Nadiya got to the U.S.

Absolutely.

- Thanks, Fin. - All right. Thank you.

- There's our girl. - And clearly pregnant.

11:14 a.m., August 2nd.

Direct flight from Kyiv?

No such thing anymore. Ukrainian airspace is closed.

She's waiting near baggage claim 14, terminal 1, and...

Who the hell is that?

A guy takes her suitcase and they head for the exit.

Where does that exit take them?

Short-term parking's right there.

And what about the cameras

at the pay stations in the parking lot?

Yeah, we can pull those.

Let's do that.

She's dead.

Well, now, see, I'm surprised that you're surprised.

Oh, no, you guys got the wrong idea here.

No, see, we just call balls and strikes here.

Now, our detectives have video footage.

Of you picking up Nadiya at JFK

and then leaving seven minutes later

out of short-term parking with Nadiya, which means--

you know what that means.

That means that--

that you were the last person to see her alive, and that,

that's a strike.

Yeah, okay, no, I'm a nobody.

No, no, today--today, you're definitely somebody.

Guys, what are we doing here?

I accept driving assignments on Telegram.

They're encrypted. I pick up, I deliver.

A little bit of crypto lands in my account.

I don't ask any questions. I don't--

All right, so after you picked up Nadiya at JFK,

where did you take her?

- Lady-- - It's Captain.

Uh, Captain,

in my line of work, answering questions like that

is bad for my health, you feel me?

No.

Not even a little.

The truth is, we don't really care if you talk or not.

- Oh, is that right? - Yeah, that's right.

The second you met Nadiya at JFK,

technically, your actions crossed international borders

and you used a means of foreign commerce.

So whatever crime you committed during that process...

Which was nothing.

Is federal.

So we can just hand you over to the Feds.

Tell them everything we know.

You were her only point of contact in the U.S.,

and now she's dead.

Oh, and just to be clear, this is a death penalty offense,

so while you're sitting there in your little cement cell,

you can think back on this moment

and wonder if not talking was the right decision.

What--what--is she insane?

Good luck.

Hey, wait.

That mean you got something to say?

Something useful?

Yeah.

Driver told Benson and Brady this is where

he dropped off Nadiya after she got to the U.S.

At an abandoned power plant?

Yeah, we've been set up on it,

but there's no signs of life in there.

No way of knowing what's inside.

One way to find out.

NYPD!

Police!

Hey, careful.

Yeah, doesn't look like

anybody's been here for a while.

Why would he bring Nadiya here?

What about that door?

Give me that light.

Ready?

Smell that?

- Bleach. - Yeah.

Found the bleach smell.

Wow.

Found the bleach over here. It's empty.

Those doors lock from the outside.

So whoever was sleeping here was locked inside.

A bunch of baby pacifiers over here.

Most of them still in the packaging.

Still warm. They just left.

Guys!

This is like a maternity ward.

So they brought Nadiya to this place,

and then they kept her here?

With a bunch of other women.

Jesus.

Is that what we're looking at?

Some kind of baby mill?

So Jess, the ME found trophoblastic degeneration

in Nadiya's uterus and an inflamed endometrium.

All right, English, por favor?

Okay, so Nadiya didn't give birth.

She suffered a miscarriage.

But here's what's strange,

is that the fetal DNA that was found in her uterine lining

is wholly unrelated to Nadiya's DNA.

So she was a surrogate carrying someone else's baby.

Is that what this is?

Nadiya was flown to the U.S.

to give birth to someone else's child?

Not just Nadiya.

These women are being trafficked,

and they're forced to carry someone else's baby.

Hey.

So we scrubbed the basement,

found traces of DNA,

but no hits on CODIS or any other database.

We tracked the SKUs of the baby supplies we found.

They were all bought with Amazon gift cards

purchased in cash

then mailed to a postal box rented under a fictitious name.

- Okay, great. - Hang on.

I got good news.

They found the car that brought Nadiya to the ER.

It's down on Houston and 2nd.

Bruno.

Hey.

Couldn't figure out how Nadiya

got from the abandoned power plant to the ER,

then I got a hit.

Caught this on a security camera outside a bodega

three blocks from the ER.

There's Nadiya getting out of this car.

And you can see a woman drove and dropped her off.

I can't make out any features. She's wearing a hat.

With a sunflower on it.

You--you run the plates?

Yeah, stolen from Staten Island.

Created an ALPR hot list,

the car got ticketed for a parking meter violation,

so I got a ping.

But what's this woman doing here?

Hey, Brady, check this out.

No, I can't help.

Okay. Will you look again, please?

'Cause this is very important.

I'm telling you I've never seen this woman.

Excuse me.

Are these people living here?

Just visiting.

Can we see your change of use permit?

I'm sorry?

Well, you're zoned for assembly, not lodging.

And if you haven't changed your zoning,

then you're subject to up to $1,000 a day in fines.

You're going to need sprinklers, ADA access,

and the city will most likely shut you down

until you get up to code.

These women are war refugees.

You can't just put them out on the street.

I'm very sorry about that, but my hands are tied.

I have to make the call.

Hey, are you okay?

I don't like begging people

to help me solve a freaking murder.

But yeah, sure, I'm fine. Why?

Uh, I don't know.

Because you just told the driver

that he's going on death row?

Well, we're allowed to lie to them.

Yes, I know that.

But then you just told the priest

that you're gonna put his war refugees out on the street.

I'm just doing my job.

Look, I understand.

A woman just got her head blown off 6 inches from you.

She pushed me out of the way, Liv.

What?

She what?

Nadiya knew she was going to die,

and the last thing she did

was put up her hand and make sure it was her and not me.

I didn't--

I didn't know that.

Okay, okay.

We're gonna get these guys.

I can't believe she's dead.

Polina, we need to understand

what happened to you, to Nadiya.

So please, let's just-- let's just start

at the beginning, okay?

Okay.

Well, a man found me and Nadiya back home in Ukraine.

And many others too.

And this man, he said I would receive a, uh, baby.

Um--

An embryo?

Yes.

He brought the embryo from the U.S.,

said that he would take me to a doctor near Kyiv

who would implant it.

And then I would give birth in the U.S.

Did they ask you any questions about yourself,

like any qualifications?

He wanted to make sure I was not Jewish or Muslim.

How much did they pay you?

- We paid them. - Wait, what?

You paid them?

For what?

He said we would give birth to anchor babies,

become U.S. citizens.

I bankrupted my family to get here.

And when we arrived, when we were locked away,

then we knew it was all a lie.

What happens to the babies?

I don't know.

When one of us gives birth--

They are just gone.

What about Nadiya?

Something was wrong with her baby.

They brought her to the bed,

but they could not save the baby.

The pain was horrible.

And it became clear

they were not going to help her.

So we escaped.

We stole the keys to that car and we ran.

I brought her to the hospital.

Okay, who-- who was involved in all this?

Who-- who was in charge of the place?

A man and a woman.

But they are very careful. We never see their faces.

I don't know their names.

The only person I know is the man who recruited me.

What is his name?

Misha. That's all I know.

Okay, well, can you describe him?

Average, quiet, about 35.

Polina, we can take you to a safe house

where nobody's going to--

No, I'm safe here.

And I'm with my people.

Okay.

Okay, well, we will be in touch with you, okay?

But in the meantime, I just-- I'll leave that with you.

Okay. Thank you.

There are 20 pregnant women out there somewhere.

You want to play follow the embryos?

How do we do that?

Well, look, if this Misha character

is flying embryos to Eastern Europe,

that means that they have to be on ice, right?

Embryos that are stored before they're implanted

into a surrogate are kept in a tank of liquid nitrogen.

Right. They call them snowflakes.

My sister did IVF. - Okay.

So you can't just hop on a plane with liquid nitrogen.

There has to be some kind of approval process.

Right.

I mean, there can only be

so many people that apply for that.

Right?

So we pull the applications

and see who's flying snowflakes to Ukraine.

Lou, I think it worked.

All right.

Isn't Misha the nickname for Mikhail in Russian?

Yeah, I think so.

Okay, take a look at this guy.

He filed 17 applications to fly with liquid nitrogen

in the last two years.

39 years old.

Lines up with the age that Polina Kravets gave us.

Yeah.

And it lists an apartment in Long Island City

as his home address.

Okay, pull his picture, bring it over to Polina.

If she says that's the guy, that's the guy.

Mm-hmm.

He lives here.

All right, get back downstairs where it's safe.

Kitchen clear.

Bathroom clear.

Misha Orlov!

Show me your hands and get on the ground.

Get on the ground!

Show me your hands!

Doesn't look like Misha's gonna be much help.

Okay, we're in.

- Great. - Hey.

Hey.

No sign of forced entry, so he probably invited them in.

Well, it looks like he was offering them tea.

Okay, so what do we actually know?

We know Misha travels regularly to Eastern Europe.

He recruits women. - Christian women.

Under false pretenses to come to the U.S.,

where they basically become vessels

and are under lock and key at some twisted baby farm.

We don't know whose embryos are getting implanted.

We don't know what happens to the babies.

We do know the people who this Misha worked for

understand we're looking for them,

and they're trying to cover their tracks,

first at the baby farm, and now here.

And we have no idea who they are.

We just found some WhatsApp messages from somebody

demanding that Misha make good on some sort of

financial arrangement.

And this person was very unhappy.

Looks like the last one was from two days ago.

It says, give us our damn baby,

or we're coming at you with everything we've got.

Misha never responded.

Hi.

Lieutenant Brady, Captain Benson, NYPD.

Oh, can I help you?

Yeah. Well, we hope so.

Um, is this-- is this your residence?

Uh, well, it's his place now.

We just work here. - Right, right.

And your name?

Carri. Carri Valenti.

Who is it, honey?

- Um-- - What's this about?

Uh, messages were sent on WhatsApp recently to a man

named Misha Orlov, we think from this apartment

based on the IP address.

And?

And he's been murdered.

Wait, what?

Can we come inside?

Um, yeah. Yes.

I'm just putting the baby down for a nap,

so give me a sec. - Thank you.

Misha Orlov was shot today in his apartment

at 11:30 a.m., we think?

Can you tell us where you were?

Uh, Jason was at work.

The baby was at my mom's. I-I was here.

I had a bunch of Zooms.

You can't possibly think we had anything to--

Well, I have a text I'd like to read you.

"Give us our damn baby,

or we're coming at you with everything we've got"?

Oh. Okay, not my finest moment,

but we had nothing to do with this.

You're gonna need to come up

with a better explanation than that.

We've tried for years to have a baby,

but we couldn't conceive.

So we thought about adoption,

but in this city, it's 75 grand.

We went online.

We found a Christian charity that made adoption affordable.

Misha was our point of contact.

And it was a dream.

You met in person?

No.

No, over the phone. You know, texts and stuff.

And what about the birth mother?

You meet her? - No, it was a closed adoption.

Okay, I'm still not following why you were so angry

and you said you were gonna come after him

with everything you've got.

Our son, he's--

he's changed everything, you know?

And so we wanted to have another.

And we sent Misha the payment, and then he just ghosted us.

He vanished.

Well, uh, I'm sorry to have to tell you this,

but we believe that you acquired your son

unwittingly on the black market.

Wait, w-what?

If that's what you think,

we're--we're not saying another word.

In fact, I think it's time that you leave.

Well--well, we're not leaving

until you give us some information.

We're not talking without a lawyer.

Get the hell out of our house! - Lawyer?

Why would you need a lawyer unless you're involved somehow?

Jess. He said lawyer.

This is a highly unusual situation.

But we understand that you need assurances

before you'll share more information with us.

Do you?

This is my son.

This is--this is our family.

We can't live with the idea

that someone might just come and take him away.

I'm a father, Ms. Valenti. I get it.

So it took some prodding,

but we won those accommodations.

A judge has issued a protective order

that will keep your identities, any statements you provide,

and all records relating to your son

sealed and restricted so that only essential parties

can see them--forever.

If we make an arrest

in the murders of Nadiya Tecun and Misha Orlov,

and we need your testimony,

you will testify under a pseudonym,

and you'll be immune from any criminal liability.

And we guarantee that no one from the NYPD or this office

will ever alert CPS to even the existence of your son.

Well, they're right.

This court order,

this is as much protection as the law provides.

Mrs. Valenti, we--we get it.

We want you to live your life, to raise your son.

But--but what that means is, is that--

that you need to do the right thing as well.

So we need you--

we need you to tell us everything that you know.

I--

I can't, I can't.

The idea that my son is the product

of some criminal underworld, it makes me sick.

I understand that.

I understand that, and that's not something that we can undo.

But there are at least 20 pregnant women

out there in the world right now who are in grave danger.

One of them is already dead,

so we need to find the rest of them.

The Valentis identify the charity they used

to adopt their baby as this outfit called Hope Lifts.

We ran it down, and it's fraudulent, like we figured.

The principles registered the charity under false names

and addresses in Malta. - Malta?

Apparently it's a hotbed for stuff like this.

I mean, all kinds of fraud.

They still use fax machines too.

Oh, a literal paper trail?

I've missed those. - Mm-hmm.

So this bogus charity's articles of incorporation

were filed by fax from an office in Tribeca

belonging to a lawyer named Derek Hobbs.

Derek Hobbs?

- Ring a bell? - Mm-hmm.

That's who the Valentis said

delivered their son to their front door.

Derek Hobbs?

NYPD.

Okay. What do you want?

We're on the way to my daughter's basketball game.

That's you about a year ago,

at the home of Jason and Carri Valenti

handing them their adopted son?

So?

Well, we believe that child is a product

of some kind of underground baby farm

where women are exploited and trafficked.

- Trafficked? - Darcy, wait in the car.

No. What are they talking about?

- Nothing. - Dad.

It's just my work. Wait in the car.

We need to know who your clients are

and who runs this operation.

As I'm sure you know, I have no legal obligation

to answer that question

or reveal the identity of any of my clients.

So if you'll excuse me.

Tell you what. I'll come with you.

What do you mean?

Well, I'll explain to your daughter

exactly who you are and what Daddy really does for a living.

We've got two people dead, Derek.

So whoever you do your grunt work for to make a buck,

they're killers.

They kept women as slaves to make babies,

which they then sold for profit.

And you're trying to hide behind the law?

I don't have anything to hide from you.

Great.

Then you don't have anything to hide from your daughter either.

Come on out, Darcy. - No, no, you stop.

Come on, come on, come on, come on.

Don't you touch my daughter.

- Come on out. - Darcy.

We're gonna talk about what Daddy does for work.

- Dad, what is this? - Stop!

Please!

It's up to you.

We could do this however you want.

So according to your lawyer buddy, Derek Hobbs,

this is the husband-and-wife team

that operated a fraudulent charity,

Sergey Volkov and Sara Tandon.

What do we know about them?

Okay, Volkov's a Russian national,

been in the U.S. for a decade.

Short sheet--nothing remarkable, nothing violent.

Sara Tandon, well, couldn't find much on her.

No property holdings,

no criminal record, no business licenses.

But this is from the ER.

Now, this is the guy who claimed to be Nadiya's brother,

then put a bullet in her head.

- That's a clear match. - This is our guy.

Now all we got to do is figure out where the hell they are.

Whoa, guys, I got something.

I went back to the original sin.

Which was?

The theft of the plates

that were on the SUV Volkov was driving.

The one that almost took your eyebrows off

in the parking garage? - That's the one.

Check this out.

I found some security footage

from the block where the plates were stolen.

So there's Volkov. - Uh-huh.

Gets into that van.

Now, those plates, they come back to him,

and two hours ago, they popped on the Verrazano-Narrows.

I tracked the van with ARGUS to a warehouse in Staten Island.

Hit it.

Holy...

It's a cryobank.

These are frozen embryos.

Snowflakes.

There's got to be hundreds of 'em.

All right, let's keep moving.

Sergey Volkov, Sara Tandon! Get on the ground!

Go!

No, no, no! Do not move!

Get on the ground! Hey!

Stay down!

Stay down!

That's some sort of PCC.

Yeah, but no pistol.

No, the murder weapon's probably long gone.

I found these by the embryo tanks.

Consent forms, medical disclosures,

and custody transfers.

They're all from the same clinic,

a place called Hudson Fertility Group.

So some of the embryos gotta be from there.

All right, let's go.

Ms. Moore, how did this work?

Our clients who undergo IVF,

they typically generate extra embryos.

They can donate them to science,

they can elect to have them disposed of as medical waste.

That can be tough.

For religious people, especially.

Right.

So you match the donors with the recipients?

Oh, no. There are charities for that.

They receive the embryos here,

match them with devout couples with the promise

that these children eventually will be raised

in faithful homes.

Right, so Hope Lifts was one of these charities.

Yes.

Who did you speak to from Hope Lifts?

The lady who ran it.

Her credentials were impeccable.

Diana Hill?

Is that Diana Hill?

Yes.

Thank you.

Ms. Tandon,

these charities perform a real public service.

For faithful people struggling with what to do

with extra embryos, people who want to be loving parents.

And you knew that.

And you exploited it.

I can almost admire the business model.

I mean, you tell these women

they're gonna become U.S. citizens

so they pay for their own trafficking.

And your raw materials,

the embryos you get donated from the fertility clinic,

it's just pure profit.

But what's the endgame?

What's the plan here?

I mean, what are you--

what are you gonna do with 400 embryos?

Lawyer.

Sara Tandon denies everything.

Other than that, she's not saying a word.

Well, we have a solid case against her

on fraud related to the fake charity,

but the trafficking piece is not a slam dunk by any stretch.

No, and there's no hard evidence

tying her to the murders of Nadiya and Misha.

We can't even put Sara Tandon at the baby farm at all.

How many years are we looking at on the charges

we feel good about?

Well, seven years, maybe.

What happened here is unspeakable.

As far as we know,

Sara Tandon is the architect of this entire thing.

She stole these women's lives,

she stole their bodies for profit.

And you're saying she could be out in, uh, three years?

Unless something changes, yes.

So we've got to chase whatever leads we can.

We'll push forward here on the charges we have

and put the rest together on the fly.

Do whatever we have to do to hold

Sara Tandon accountable for this whole damn thing.

I got it.

The warrant landed, getting us into Volkov and Sara Tandon's

encrypted Discord messages.

Let's hope there's something useful in there,

not just Sara telling Volkov to go take out the trash.

There's got to be something, right?

I mean, this can't just happen.

What, that a woman is murdered

within 6 inches of you in broad daylight,

and you can't make the case?

- Yeah, that. - Wait.

Hang on.

All right, check out this flurry of messages

from November 30th between Volkov, Sara Tandon,

and somebody.

"We'll take them all."

As in all of the embryos?

Who would want to buy 400 embryos?

Maybe they mean all the babies that were set to be born

in the next few months.

Well, I don't mean to beat a dead horse,

but who would want 20 babies at the same time?

Look at that.

Sara Tandon says, "I can make a delivery on December 2nd."

Well, that's yesterday.

So whoever's communicating with them here,

let's try to tie these messages to an IP address,

to a location.

Got it.

Do it.

Clear!

- Clear! - Clear!

Clear!

I don't think anybody's home.

Hey.

Main house is clear.

Well, check this out.

Oh, my God.

That's a Fowgeis.

Ancient Germanic thing-- the Vandals.

Been appropriated by some very bad people.

If you hang this,

it means you're willing to die for the cause.

- What's the cause? - Hate.

We got one more structure to clear.

All right, let's go.

Found a freaking bomb factory.

This is a lot of hardware.

So Volkov and Tandon

were talking to a bunch of white supremacists.

White supremacists with an arsenal.

But what does a hate group have to do with a baby mill?

Whatever the reason, we need to get the bomb squad in here.

I'll give them a heads up.

Shh, hold on. You hear that?

Everyone out! Move, now!

- Move! Move! Move! - Everyone out, now!

- Let's go, let's go! - Now!

- Move, move! - Everybody out, now!

Oh, my God.

Bruno. Oh, God.

- Ow. - Oh, God.

I need a bus, now!

You're okay.