All language subtitles for Law and order S14E09 - Compassion

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.

I'm telling you.
It was like a Russian novel...

long, hard
and forever to finish.

Julie must've been thrilled.
Can you say, “Go, Bronco, go"?

I'll stick with Mother Nature's own,
thank you.

See that guy over there?
What is he? 45, 50?

How much you wanna bet that seat's
saved for some 25-year-old?

Oh, and you can tell that he's
popping vitamin “V” just by looking?

Everybody is, man.
Look...

I don't want my good buddy to be the last guy
on the train to...
What, “Go, Bronco, go"?

Exactly.
I don't like doctors. I don't like popping pills.

[Grunting Loudly]

Oh, my God!
Hey, somebody get a doctor!

[Man] His name was Gideon Blake.

Business card puts his office
out in Brooklyn.

So, what, did he have a heart attack?
I haven't talked to the M.E.

All I know is he had
a reservation for two at 1:00.

So where's the companion?
A no-show.

Welcome to
"The Case of the Killer Shellfish. ”

One oyster, dropped like that.

Since when do we
become the food police?

- Take a smell.
- We know what oysters smell like, Cantor.

I mean of him.

It's like bitter almonds.
Which aren't on the menu.

That's cyanide, right?
This dude's been poisoned?

Get these to Forensics, but the
smell test tells me they're clean.

So he picked a winner
on the first try?

Either that...

or the poison's in here.

“Devil's Own Hot Sauce."

Excuse me.
You use a lot of this?

“Devil's Own"?
We don't stock it at all.

You know, I gotta tell you-- a lot of
guys bring in their own hot sauce.

It's sorta like women and their water
bottles-- like a status thing.

Please tell me it wasn't the oysters.
Yeah, we'll let you know.

Sorry Detective, but that dining companion
you was asking about-- she's here.

- She says she's a doctor.
- Tell her she's too late.

No, no. We were colleagues.

Actually, it was supposed to be a working lunch.
I was interviewing him.

Mr. Blake was a doctor too?

No, Gideon wasn't a physician.

He-- He practiced
an alternative kind of healing.

You mean like acupuncture?

No, he made people
feel better emotionally--

especially those
who had recently suffered losses.

Oh, oh. Like a grief counselor?

Something like that, yes.

You know what, Dr. Allison?

I don't mean to be rude here,
but you're not being very helpful.

No, because I know
how you're going to respond to this.

Well, why don't you try us out?

Well, he held seminars...

and... séances.

He talked to the dead?

Just a guess, but, uh,
he didn't do it for nothing, did he?

Well, why would he?
He helped people who were hurting.

But, you're a real doctor, right?
Yes, I am.

I'm an oncologist
with a specialty in pediatrics.

And you believe in séances?

I'm not so quick to judge them.

Medical journals are filled
with cases of near-death experiences.

And who is to say
that there's no truth to them?

You didn't go to medical school
in Haiti, did you?

No. Cambridge, Mass.

And you can read all about me if you like...

on the dust covers
of any one of my three best sellers.

Forensics says
the hot sauce had the cyanide,

so we contacted the manufacturer
in Red River, Louisiana,

asked them to recall the batch.
Yeah, all 12 bottles.

This Dr. Allison says that
she's seen him use the bottle
a lot in the past,

so whoever spiked it
did so recently.

And knew Mr. Blake's
eating habits pretty well.

Blake rips off widows by claiming
to contact their dead husbands.

He's a con man.
Con men piss people off.

And pissed-off people
like to get even.

Track them down and talk to them.

[Woman]
It's not that weird

What, you mean
Blake getting murdered?

I mean talking to the dead
or trying to figure out life.

Between the Holy Ghost,
Buddha and EST,

there's plenty of weird stuff
to believe in.

Yeah, but some beliefs
are cheaper than others.

We know you gave Gideon Blake
almost $10,000 in the last six months.

My money, my choice.

And what trust fund
did you grow up in?

Someone tells me about a guy
who specializes in psychic healing?

I mean, who can it hurt?
I'll bet you didn't ask your banker that one.

Truth is, Gideon was better than
any shrink could have been after Ben--

my boyfriend-- took a header
off his Harley.

He helped you talk to Ben?

I was in a room with 10 other people
who were hurting-

that alone made me feel better.

I don't know-- negative energy
is dispersed or something.

- So Why'd you quit going?
- Ernie.

Met him at the gym.
I mean, man, the guy's got a six-pack.

One morning,
I was making Herb's oatmeal,

and he didn't
come out of the bathroom.

You can imagine the rest.

Well,just because he was 80,

doesn't mean
that I was ready for him to die.

So then you went to see Gideon Blake.
You gave him $13,000,
and then you suddenly stopped going?

Well, that is the curse
of joint checking.

She found out--
my daughter, the know-it-all.

She made you stop.
Well, she said Gideon was some kind of swindler.

Out of the mouths of babes.
Well, I didn't believe her,

but as it turned out, she was right.

- I hate to admit.
- What convinced you?

Mr. Devine.
Mr. Devine?

Who's that?
Well, he's an expert.

My Susie wouldn't make a move
without an expert.

So Mr. Devine is an expert
on contacting the dead?

He's an investigator like you,
only he doesn't have a badge.

Well, what did he find out?

That Mr. Blake!
He told us that he grew up in Boston,

that he went to Dartmouth
and that he lectured at Oxford.

Do you know he lied about everything?

Good news is no one named Gideon Blake
ever had so much as a parking ticket.

And the bad news?
No one named Gideon Blake
ever had so much as a parking ticket.

Expand to the tristate area.
We already did. No criminal record anywhere.

A national Internet search,
using every variation of the name,
also came up empty.

He paid rent, didn't he?
He had to have a bank account.

Ed and Lennie are
running the financials now.

[ Telephone Rings]

Van Buren. No, I'll take it.
Put him through.

Are you kidding?

Fax it to me A.S.A.P.

I'm just trying to find out
who paid the real estate taxes.

'Cause I'm a cop, that's why.

Just checking. Uh-huh.

And you didn't need
a Social Security number for that?

Yeah, but you didn't check it out.
Let me have it.

- Thank you too.
- Three years? You're kidding.

All right, forget it.

This guy bought this place
three years ago,

ain't paid a nickel
of real estate tax since.

One bank account, checking only,
and get this:

They never even checked to see
if his Social Security number was valid.

Your man still a ghost?

If he was still alive,
I'd hire him to talk to himself.

Well, this may help.

His prints matched a guy
the feds have been looking for
for over a year,

name of Lee Wayne Mapes.

Oh, yeah, Mapes.
Real estate fraud with a capital "F.”

What did he do?
Have you seen that play, The Producers?

Not on what the city pays us.

Anyway, it's about these guys
that sell a thousand percent
of a Broadway show.

They make a killing
unless the plays a hit

in which case they've gotta
pay back their investors
with money they don't have.

That's what Mapes
did with the buildings?

Buildings, shopping centers, hotels--
all around the country.

Always targeting doctors.
Go where the money is.

Well, they got it,
but don't understand what to do with it.

The only difference
between Mapes and the Broadway guys...

is that his castle crumbled
when the real estate market fell.

And boy did it fall.
Like a latke. But Mapes was gone with the wind

Well, the good news
is we found him.

The bad news is he's dead.

Hey, it's all good news for me.
I get to close the book on him.

We're thinking
that one of his unhappy investors
put him out of his misery.

Sure. I'll get you the files.

It looks like
half the A.M.A. invested

You'd think a brain surgeon
would know better.

I'll see your brain surgeon
and raise you two allergists
and a pediatrician.

I gotta admit--
Mapes must have been good.

There's some
heavy hitters in here.

An oncologist.
Oh, I've got a couple of those.

You got one named Allison?

As in Dr. Allison
who missed her lunch date
with Gideon Blake?

She invested in a shopping center
in Flagstaff, Arizona...

lost half a million dollars.

Now that could make somebody
mad enough to kill.

We 're really here to talk to Dr. Allison.
Then you got what you came for.

Uh, Dr. Bethany Allison?
My wife.

We're a two-doctor household.
It's not that unusual.

When will your wife be home?

She won't-- not soon.
We're separated.

So which one of the two of you
in vested in the Arizona shopping center
that went sour?

That would be both of us.

One thing they don't teach you
in medical school is what to do
with the money you make.

What about losing it--
say half a million dollars' worth?

That they covered.
Lots of Xanax.

For both you and your wife?

I'm an “ear, nose and throat" guy.

I remove tonsils,
get to reward kids with ice cream.

It's nothing like the kind of medicine
Bethany practices.

Meaning what?
She spends all of her time and energy
with terminally ill kids.

Her work is demanding
and draining and relentless.

So how'd she handle losing the money?
She could careless.

- What about you?
- I freaked.

But eventually I got over it
and focused on the positive--
my practice, my son--

And getting your wife back?

Oh, the money had nothing to do
with her leaving.

What did,
if you don't mind me asking?

Twenty years of watching children die.

She just needed some time
to write and recharge... alone.

Where can we find your wife now?

8:00. My guess is
she's still at the hospital.

All right then.
Thank you.

[Knocking]
[Briscoe] Sorry to bother you.

Oh. Annie, I'd like to introduce
you to some friends of mine.

This is Detective Briscoe
and Detective Green.

Hi.
Hi,Annie. How you feeling?

It's not so bad--
not like last time.

That's right. And tomorrow
she's gonna have a real breakfast.

She's gonna have cereal and fruit.
Strawberries too?

Oh, absolutely.

Ruth, would you come
and put Annie to bed for me, please?

Sure. I'd love to.
Good night.

Good night, my sweet girl.

I'll see you in the morning,
honey.

Sweet dreams.

That's heartbreaking.
Yup.

Gotta concentrate
on the small victories. Thank you.

So, were you able to
find out anything about Gideon?

Yes. Actually, we found out
his real name is Lee Wayne Mapes.

What are you talking about?
Gideon Blake was a real estate swindler
named Mapes.

I don't believe that.
Well, you better start,

'cause he's the one
that took a half a million dollars
from you and your husband.

Are you kidding me?

Look, that whole real estate transaction
was done on paper...

with lawyers and accountants
and professionals who do that sort of thing.

I didn't understand one word about it,

and my husband and I
just signed where they told us to.

On the bottom of the check.
And that was it.

I never met the principals.
I don't even think I ever heard their names.

All I knew was
“Flag Two Partners Limited...

Wait a minute.

You think I killed Gideon
because he stole money from me
in some other persona?

Well, you've got to admit that
you showing up at Gideon's center...

right after he ripped you off
is quite a coincidence.

No. I have a friend
who works in a hospice,

and she told me
about a seminar on crossing over.

I didn't even know who Gideon Blake was.

I certainly didn't know
he was Lee Mapes.

I was just interested in doing research
for my next book.

Of all the gin joints in all the world, huh?
That's right.

And if you can't tell already,
my life is not about money,

and it certainly is not about killing.

So if you don't mind,
I really do have some patients
I need to see.

Yeah. Go, go.

Well, hello to you guys.
Hi.

I thought people like her moved to India
to help the staving orphans.

You believe that story
that she didn't know Mapes was Gideon?

Hey, you're talking to a guy
who bought the words
“till death do us part" twice.

There's two words
that should never go together.

Hey, look.
just for the hell of it.

Hey, man. Excuse me.

Are you a doctor?
[Chuckles]

You should see my mom smile
every time someone asks me that.

Just out of curiosity,
you all have cyanide here?

You may wanna talk to the lab guys.
Where are they?

Well-- you're really cops,
right?

You should see my mom smile.

Okay, wait. I'll get you up there
with my elevator card.

Bethany was one lab station
over for about 18 months.

Do you know
what she was working on?
Solid tumor therapies.

Using live animals like you do?
What, are you one of those
anti-animal testing types?

You know, we test for medical purposes,
not to make a better mascara.

Uh, could her methods
have included the use of cyanide?

I can't imagine why.
Well, what about
anybody else down here?

Nate Fleisch is doing research
on cyanide-antidote protocols
for E.M.S. and E.R. use.

You know where we can find him?
Nate?

By now he's either on his third scotch
or his second nurse.

Can anybody
just walk into Nate's lab?

If you can get to this floor,
you can get to any lab.

Thanks a lot, Doc.

It's time for a warrant.

Does it really take a platoon
to search my small apartment?

Well, it won't take long.
I'm telling you. You're wasting your time.

Oh, I've made a career out of that.
[Chuckles]

The fig tree has been around
for 6,000 years.

The Romans said
Bacchus gave mankind the fig.

I'm trying to protect this one
from being damaged by an early frost.

The people
who lived here before me...

hardly did anything
to take care of it at all.

Yeah, I had a flowerpot
out on my fire escape,

but the bugs
destroyed anything I put in it.

Mm. Squirrels are the problem here.

Just won't stay away from the figs,
especially this time of year.

Nothing a little rat poison
wouldn't cure.

No, you have to be very careful.
Pesticides can harm a tree.

Hey, Lennie? It's clean.

[Dr. Allison ]
I could have saved you the trouble.

Sorry about this, Dr. Allison.
You have a job to do.

Uh, good luck with the squirrels.
Thank you.

Come on. Just dump it.
You know, if I called this in on a citizen,
it'd be a hundred dollar fine.

Yeah, but then you'd have to
go to court, waste a whole day.

Damn. Even her garbage
is organized.

Yeah, unless you're a rodent.

That's nasty.

Stop!

Well, from comparative blood tests,

chemo-analysis of muscle tissues
and urinalysis,

both victims died from the same cause.

Which was?
Cyanide poisoning.

Potassium cyanide to be precise.
I didn't know there were different flavors.

Oh sure. There's hydrogen cyanide,
sodium cyanide, potassium cyanide--
Yeah, we get the picture.

The good news is, the end came quickly
for both Blake and "Rocky the Squirrel."

How can you tell?
The large blood concentration...

would cause immediate
loss of consciousness
followed quickly by death.

If you gotta go, it's not a bad way.

She took the cyanide from the lab,
spiked Blake's hot sauce,

then dumped it into her garden
to protect her fig tree from squirrels.

And she knew
he was gonna use
the hot sauce for lunch?

Her LUDS show
that on the day of the murder...

she called Gideon's cell phone,
and then she called the restaurant
to make a reservation.

Well, if it was all about the money,
why did she wait a year to kill him?

"Revenge is a meal best served cold?"

Yeah, especially
if you got the hot sauce
to cover up the stink.

Pick her up.

I've got my rounds to do,
so this really needs to be quick.
Okay.

Bethany Rose Allison, you're under arrest
for the murder of Gideon Blake.

Is that quick enough for you, Doc?
You have the right to remain silent.

Anything you say
could be used against you
in a court of law.

[Man]
Docket number 57492.

People v. Bethany Rose Allison.

The charge is murder in the second degree.

Didn't I see you on Oprah?
Charlie Rose, Your Honor.

Dr. Allison is a best-selling author
as well as a doctor.

[Judge] No time for law school?
Too busy dealing with dying children.

Never mind.
How do you plead?

Not guilty.

How are we on bail, Ms. Southerlyn?
As the defendant
murdered a man for money--

If I may, Your Honor,
the People have this crazy notion
that my client killed a man...

because he stole
a half million dollars from her.

- I have to admit, as far as reasons go--
- We have the bank records, Your Honor.

And I'm sure the trial judge and jury
will love to see them.

Bail is set at $300,000, cash or bond.
[Gavel Raps]

Read her books, for God's sakes.
[Huffs]

No, don't bother.
just read the blurbs on the back cover.

“Genius“ -- that was the president
of the medical society who said that.

“What a health professional should be:
compassionate, caring and courageous."

Oh, that one was written
by a Nobel Prize winner in medicine.

I'm sure she's very good at her job.

Unfortunately,
that has nothing to do
with a murder trial.

How many times do I need to say this?
I didn't know that Gideon was Mapes.

So it's just a coincidence
that you ended up...

working for the man
who stole a half a million dollars from you?

- Yes, that's right.
- And the fact that the victim
died of cyanide poisoning...

and that you, against regulations,
took cyanide from your lab,
that's also a coincidence?

And that would be a good question
if you were permitted to ask it.

The police had a valid warrant.

To search her house, not her garbage.

My motion to exclude the dead squirrel
on the basis of an illegal search.

[Branch] Curtilage?

Did you explain to His Honor
that a garbage can on a sidewalk
is not curtilage?

It was like talking to a wall, Arthur.

He bought Swift's argument...

even though the house number
was stenciled onto the garbage can.

Don't tell me Dr. Allison
had an expectation of privacy?

Even if the squirrel's
inadmissible,

we can still prove that she had
cyanide available to her at the lab.

Let's put our cards on the table.

On the one hand, we have a woman
who's devoted to saving lives.

On the other, a man who's
devoted to ripping off the public.

And that's
exactly why she killed him.

On paper, this woman
looks like the next best thing
to Mother Teresa.

Except Mother Teresa never
hunted down someone to kill them.

Wait a minute, Jack.
Dr. Allison insists she never knew
Mapes and Blake were one and the same.

Everyone who believes that,
raise their hand.

Ask me again and I'll have you
brought in for a hearing test.

We never met Mapes.

Because if you said you did know Mapes,
you realize that that would be
strong evidence against your wife.

And you think I'm lying
in some misguided attempt
to protect her.

Well, getting rid of Gideon Blake
may have been a very good start.

But that's not the way she thinks.
Vengeance is not in her vernacular.

$500,000 could change that.
Oh, please.

You didn't think it was odd that your wife,
a highly trained medical professional,

was spending time
with somebody who claimed
that they could speak to the dead?

Well, research doesn't always
take place in a lab.

Archimedes was taking a bath
when he discovered the theory
of volume and density.

The only difference
is he wasn't charging
a thousand dollars per bath.

Whoa. You think Bethany
was in cahoots with Mapes?

She made skeptics believe.

Not all of them.
What do you mean?

A woman called here last week
looking for Bethany.

Someone from Blake's group.
She was definitely angry.

At Bethany?
No, at Blake.

Do you remember a name?

I wrote it down somewhere.

When Charlie died, a girlfriend
told me about Gideon Blake's center.

She said it worked wonders
for her mother-in-law.

So you figured, “What the hell?"
Actually, I figured, “What a crock."

I mean, come on,
talking to the dead?
Give me a break.

Charlie was a doctor.
He used to laugh out loud--
But you tried it anyway.

Listen, her books--

before I read them,
I wasn't eating, I wasn't sleeping.

She brought me out of the darkness.

Bethany Allison was like
the Good Housekeeping
Seal of Approval.

I'm sorry.

It's been a year.
I should be over it.

[Sighs]

One of these days
I'll get used to people
calling me a widow.

How many of Blake's workshops
did you go to?

I was there
for exactly two minutes.

You're kidding.
No. All it took was one look at Blake.

I knew who he really was
He had shaved his beard,
but it was him--

Lee Wayne Mapes,
the guy who ripped us off
for a quarter of a million dollars.

I remembered him
from the closing.

Did you call the police?
I was going to, but first I wanted to tell Dr. Allison.

I mean, I felt I owed it to her.

We actually met right here.

She was shocked, totally stunned.

I mean, she had actually fallen
for this guy's act.

And when you told her
that he was a con man and that
you were gonna press charges?

She thanked me. Then asked me
not to do anything just yet.

So Bethany found out
Blake was Mapes.

Big deal.
It doesn't prove anything.

Considering
he stole all that money from her,
a jury might disagree.

Especially when they hear
that your client had that revelation
Just two days before Blake's murder.

Again with the money?
Come on.

This is a woman
who gives three-quarters
of her royalties to charity.

Besides, she and her husband
are doctors. They'll make it back.

- I'm offering man one
with a recommendation.
- Have you been listening to me?

I just thought you might want to
discuss the alternatives with your client

Sorry. What are we discussing?

You killed a man...

and I'm offering eight and a third
to 25 years.

Well, if you're referring to Gideon,

I helped him,
and he thanked me for it.

Excuse me?

I spoke to Gideon this morning,
and he thanked me.

He did what?

Gideon. He sounded very happy.

Jack?

- If this is an act--
- It fooled the hell out of me.

My notice papers will be on your desk
before end of business.

See you in court.

Thank you very much.

[Skoda] I've read your books.
Did you lose someone?

No. it was just my own research.
I see private patients as well.

People are so scared.

About what?
Dying.

I thought it was really the unknown
that they're scared of.

Well, it's my job to assure them
that it's not unknown.

How?

It's just a natural part of life.

That's true, but that doesn't
make it any less unknown.

I'm in a difficult position here, Doctor.
I know that my lawyer thinks I'm insane.

But you don't?

I don't want to go to prison.

How do you deal with all the death?

Do I have nightmares?
Oh, sure, I do.

But honestly, I don't know what's worse,
the nightmare...

or the phone call in the middle of the night
telling me that a six-year-old child has died.

Why did you choose pediatric oncology
as a specialty?

Children shouldn't suffer.

Many people who elect something like that
do so because of a loss.

All right, that's very good

My sister.

She was 13 years old.
Leukemia.

And the medicine they gave her just...

made her blow up like a beach ball.

And she was so beautiful,

and she was in so much pain.

And to my 12-year-old eyes, I thought
“This treatment is worse than the disease.“

And when she died, I--

What?

She took a part of me with her.

- Where?
- [Chuckles]

I'm not going to get
into a metaphysical dialogue
with you, Dr. Skoda.

There is a heaven.
Let's just leave it at that.

Okay, then let's talk about trust.
All right. What about trust?

You trusted Gideon Blake.

You believed he was helping his clients.
Then you learned he was a con man.

People change.

Not only was he a con man,
he was the con man who conned you.

Dr. Skoda, I deal with life and death.

Money, real estate, tax shelters-

they are meaningless to me.

What can I tell you?
She's one of the smartest people
I've ever examined.

Warm, compassionate.
You are still married, aren't you, Emil?

As long as
you can say she was legally sane,
I don't care how warm she is.

Oh, she was sane
at the time of the murder.

But?
She pisses me off.

Any rational doctor with her specialty
knows the emotional toll it can have.

They take measures to protect themselves.

You mean like therapy?
Medical counseling, religious counseling.

And not some John Edwards,
Dionne Warwick hocus-pocus.

And then to actually use that
as an excuse to commit murder-
unconscionable.

So you're saying this is an act.

Yeah. Unfortunately,
this woman is smart enough
and sympathetic enough...

to just maybe get away with it.

To be sure, pediatric oncology...

is one of the most devastating specialties
in all of medicine.

The practitioner is exposed to
repeatedly intense negative experiences.

Children dying.

It's got to be emotionally draining.

[Skoda]
There is an ever-present sense of loss.

A loss which cannot be prevented

In your opinion,
how does Dr. Allison deal with this loss?

She's constructed an emotional shield,
if you will,

to protect her unconscious
from turmoil.

Does this shield protect her
from being damaged.

By all loss in all aspects of her life?

No, that would be impossible.
The psyche is, if anything, vulnerable.

So if she lost a large portion
of her life savings,

she would be hurt by that?

Yes.
And she would react?

Actually, she might overreact.

Her professional feelings of loss
could be displaced.

And she might kill the person
who caused that loss?

Yes.

Did Dr. Allison tell you
she communicates with the afterlife?

Yes.

She sees dead people, Doctor.

Wouldn't you say a thing like that
can affect her behavior?

Under the legal definition
of insanity in this state--

Yes or no, Dr. Skoda?

Yes.

Thank you.

You know, you want to believe,
even though you know it's crazy

You've got this little bit of hope.

And that's why you got involved
with Gideon Blake in the first place?

It took some pushing.
What finally convinced me...

was when I heard
that Dr. Allison was involved.

- The defendant?
- That's right.

Her books were a godsend.

They helped me get over the grief
of my husband's death.

Please tell us what occurred
when you arrived at Gideon Blake's house.

I knew him right away.

He was the man who swindled us
out of a lot of money on a real estate deal.

I knew that a person like Dr. Allison
wouldn't work with him if she knew.

So I-- I called her and told her.

What?

That he was a con artist, a fake.

What did she do?

Please answer the question,
Mrs. Padgett.

Dr. Allison is a good person.
I don't want to--

What did she say when you told her
Mr. Blake's true identity?

She said to give her time to deal with it
before I reported him to the police.

And?

The next thing I knew,
he was dead.

Did Dr. Allison say
she was going to kill Gideon Blake?

No. I just thought
she was gonna tell him off,

tell him she knew
who and what he really was.

Did she tell you that, as Mapes,
he had ripped her off too?

No.

When you heard that Blake was murdered,
did you go to the police?

No.
Why not?

Because the son of a bitch deserved it.

You know how my husband died?

He put a hunting rifle in his mouth
and pulled the trigger.

You want to know why?

Because Lee Wayne Mapes stole everything
he spent his life working for.

Mapes deserved to die.

I just wish it could have been me
who killed him.

Thank you.

A grieving widow
who's only a widow because of Mapes?

The defense couldn't
buy better testimony than that.

It's just a detour for the jury.
We'll get them back
on the main road tomorrow.

Which is?

That the great Dr. Allison
killed Mapes over a pile of money,

her hocus-pocus about communing
with the afterlife notwithstanding.

Not everything spiritual
is hocus-pocus, Jack.

Et tu, Serena?

On my last birthday,
I got three gift certificates
to three different psychics.

Which doesn't say much for your friends.

My point is, is that not everybody
dismisses the spiritual.

It's a pacifier.

Like shrinks are for your generation
and bartenders for your father's?

My old man's bartender
could keep a secret.

Have you read the C.V.
of Allison's psychiatric expert?

Yeah. I stopped after the M.D. from Yale
and the second Ph.D. from Columbia.

I'm gonna get some sleep.

Hey. Did you have a birthday?

For any doctor,
it's difficult to lose a patient.

You wonder. You question yourself.

You pray. You mourn.

But when your patients
are so young and so many die,

that is accompanied
by a whole other set of psychoneuroses.

Doctors lose perspective.

By a loss of perspective,
you mean seeing dead people?

I mean needing to see them.

To believe in
a full-blown afterlife...

is the only way you can continue
to treat incurable patients.

And if that belief was shattered?

That could have thrown her
into a depression...

from which she might
never have returned.

So when Dr. Allison learned
that Gideon Blake was a con man?

She had to destroy him.

And if she didn't?

Her self-image, her self-worth,

her ability
to get up in the morning...

to treat terminally ill children
would have been destroyed.

Do you treat what you call “at risk" physicians
on a regular basis, Doctor?

Yes.

- Any of them pediatric oncologists?
- Several.

And they suffer from post-traumatic
stress syndrome like Dr. Allison?
Yes, but...

Any of them ever kill anyone?

No.

My cousin's kid had pneumonia.
I went and visited her
at the children's hospital

That's the day that I crossed
med school off my list.

Bethany Allison may have spent
most of her life being a saint.

It's the time she didn't
that we have to deal with.

I think what Serena is saying is that
banging her head against the futility
of dying children everyday for years...

may have knocked a few screws loose.

Then she would have claimed
that she was insane right up front.

She didn't. The first thing she did
was claim she wasn't involved.

Believe me, if she learned anything
from Blake/Mapes over the past year,

it's how to pull off the big con.

This is all an act. She killed the bum
who ripped her off. Period, end of story.

Well, I don't envy you having to go into court
and prove the saint's a sinner.

No, Arthur. I only have to prove
that she's not crazy.

Most of my patients
are young children...

at an age where they would be in kindergarten
if they weren't in chemotherapy.

In terms of the larger picture,

is there any national data on how many
pediatric oncology patients survive?

About 75 to 80%.

And in your practice?
About 25%.

Does that mean
you're not very good
at what you do?

I specialize in high-risk patients...

with advance-stage neuroblastomas
and rhabdoid tumors of the kidney.

[Swift]
So you've seen hundreds of children die?

Occupational hazard
when you work with kids
with bad cancers.

Much of my day is divided between...

trying to lessen both their physical pain
and their emotional fear.

In other words,
you prepare them for death.

Many children anticipate
a better life after life.

For example?

Henry-- he was about eight years old.

He was in stage four,
and he had the nurse call me
very late one night,

and I rushed to the hospital,
got to his room, sat by him.

And he whispered to me.
He said--

He said “Dr. B,

“Have them take me out in an ambulance
with the siren on,

so that Isabel will know I'm coming."

Isabel was Henry's roommate in the hospital,
and she had died the week before.

What brought you to Gideon Blake's center
in the first place?

I heard about his work
from a nurse in a hospice.

She said he was involved
in grief counseling...

by contacting loved ones
who'd passed away.

You actually believed
he could do something like that?

Not at first, but I was researching
all aspects of death and dying,

and if this actually comforted people,
I really wanted to see it, to study it,
record it.

So this had nothing to do
with the money he stole from you?

Oh, no. I had no idea that he was
involved in my real estate losses.

I never saw him before.
He never saw me before.

And Mr. Blake didn't mind you observing
what went on in his sessions?

On the contrary, he was all for it.
He believed in what he was doing...

and he thought that my name
would lend credibility to the center.

You didn't mind lending your name?
I did at first.

- But what changed?
- I watched him work.

He was a faith healer. He was able
to do what he claimed he could do.

Talk to the dead?
Communicate with the dead
There's a difference.

He was able to comfort the grieving
and it was a gift.

So why did you poison him?

To help him make a peaceful journey
and to avoid the coming pain.

What kind of pain?
The pain of going to prison...

and of losing the ability
to continue his work.

And this peaceful journey, it was to--

Heaven.

Thank you, Dr. Allison.

Didn't he deserve to go to prison
for stealing people's hard-earned money?

No, he was not that man
“Mapes" anymore.

He had redeemed himself
through his good works with the bereaved.

Redeemed himself or reinvented himself?

I said redeemed
Yes, you did, but didn't he just
trade one con for another?

He moved from real estate fraud
to this sham about an afterlife?

It is real. I can see the children.
They are safe and happy.

- Isn't that sweet?
- Objection!

Withdrawn. You know,
I would have thought they'd be upset.

I mean, they got cheated
out of a lot of life.

Yes, of course,
but when they finally arrive-
No, no.

Let's just stick with the time
before they pass away for the moment.

Do they ever complain...
I don't know... say how unfair it is?

Yes, of course.
We had one little girl, Angela,

who compared it to the time
that her sister took her Pooh Bear
and lost it.

Sure, Mom could find her another one,
but it would never be the same.

And Angela was mad at her sister?

Yes.
Mad enough to hit her?

Why, it's human nature.
Of course it is.

When someone steals something from you,
you get mad.
No.

I see where you're going.
I see what you're doing.

True or false, Dr. Allison

Gideon Blake, a.k.a. Lee Mapes,

convinced you to invest $500,000
in a real estate deal?

He convinced my accountant.
I never met him.

True or false,

$500,000 was a good portion
of your net worth at that time,

and you lost the entire amount
of your investment?

Yes.

Angela's sister stole her doll
and she got mad-- mad enough to hit.

You said it was human nature.

Did you feel like hitting Gideon Blake
when he stole your family's life savings?

Gideon is in a wonderful place.

[Sighs]
It's a paradise.

I sent him there.
And I did it for the children.

To be with the children.

Why didn't you pack up
your best-selling books,
your awards, your degrees...

and hop on over to the other side?

I mean, a medical professional
with decades of experience...

has to be better qualified
than a snake-oil salesman!

Gideon made people feel better.

I did not. I failed.

They all died because I failed.

I work and work and they still die--

four-year-olds and six-year-olds
and . .

Innocent little babies,

[Sniffles]
They all leave this world alone
without a mother or a father,

without even a friend or a d-doll.

And they were alone for so long, but...

they're not anymore,
because Gideon is with them,

and I-- I can see them.

They are happy and they are safe.

Ask them.

Oh, don't be afraid, Mr. McCoy.

Ask them.

Henry will tell you. Isabel will tell you
Amy will tell you.

Recess, Your Honor?

Four minutes.
[Sighs]

Always have to play the tough guy, don't you?
Tough has nothing to do with this.

You feel for the woman, Jack.
It doesn't make you weak.

Three minutes.

I could win this case, you know?

Not when the judge instructs the jury
on the definition of legal insanity.

Ten years is a long time.

She killed a man.
A scoundrel

Ten years or...

until a panel of three medical professionals
certifies she's not a threat to herself or others.

Doctors to be chosen by my office.

But in the private psychiatric facility
of her choice.

To be approved of by me
and located within my jurisdiction.

One minute.
[Sighs] Done.

I tell the judge.

It's not a bad thing, Jack.
What?

Having a heart.

What can I say?

Nobody's made of steel,
not even someone with a 160 I.Q.

Turns out neither are you.
What?

It's called compassion, Jack.

Don't make it a habit, my friend.

Sometimes the good you do
doesn't do you any good.

[Howling]