Written By Mick Betancourt
Directed By David Platt
Mrs. Walker (Gail O'Grady) visits the SVU to report her granddaughter Sierra missing. Sierra's mother Ashley (Hilary Duff) is suspected of killing her - but when the body is discovered, it emerges Sierra died from measles since she was too young to be vaccinated. The SVU establishes that she was infected after another child passed on the disease at a public playground; his mother, Monica Stewart (Anastasia Barzee), refuses to vaccinate on religious grounds. Ashley's family hires a celebrity lawyer to sue the city, and the case quickly becomes politically contentious. Stabler and Benson are forced to arrest Stewart, but she is found not guilty of criminally negligent homicide.
Subsequently, Mrs. Walker and Ashley begin harassing Stewart and vandalizing her home, and are arrested at Stewart's house. Ashley's father (Mike Pniewski) runs inside the house after Stewart, and a gunshot is heard. Stabler and Benson follow him, but find he has committed suicide; Stewart says he told her this was so she would have to live with the guilt of being responsible for two deaths.
This episode contains examples of:
- Abusive Parents: Monica Stewart not vaccinating her son causes the death of young Sierra Walker because she was too young to be vaccinated.
- The Alcoholic: Ralph Walker is a recovering one, having quit drinking for his granddaughter who he loved dearly. Gail and Ashley, however, still seem to be wrestling with the bottle off and on.
- Ate His Gun: Ralph Walker does this thanks to Monica Stewart more or less getting away with criminally negligent homicide against his granddaughter and his wife and daughter's toxic influence.
- Awful Wedded Life: Mrs. Walker is verbally abusive to her husband, who in turn is neglectful and apathetic towards her. They are constantly arguing over their daughter, and seemingly only stayed together because of money and their granddaughter.
- Baby-Doll Baby: Ashley's babysitter treats a baby doll like a real one, she even flips out when the detectives get her telling them to "not wake up the baby", it's even lampshaded upon that it's just a doll."Lady, unless this is Pinocchio he's not waking up."
- Break the Haughty: While relatively unfazed by being put on trial for Sierra Walker's death, Monica Stewart is later shown to be rattled when Ashley and her mother vandalize her home. After Ralph commits suicide in front of her, she's left a sobbing mess.
- Daddy's Girl: Ashley and her father are devoted to each other, to the disgust of his wife who accuses him of enabling Ashley.
- Dating What Daddy Hates: Stabler discovers that the measles outbreak originated from an Amish boy who had snuck out to the city to visit an illicit girlfriend who is not of his faith. The boy's father is not impressed when he finds out.
- Death of a Child: Sierra died of a disease which kickstarts the plot.
- Downer Ending: Sierra is found dead, Monica gets off legally scot-free, and then Ralph shoots himself in front of her while holding a photo of his granddaughter. Right before he kills himself, he looks her in the eye and says, "Now you've killed two people."
- Dysfunctional Family: Ashlee clearly didn't have the best home life growing up, with an abrasive mother and alcoholic father. It's implied to be why she's irresponsible and a Hard-Drinking Party Girl even after becoming a mother herself.
- The Friend No One Likes: Dale Stuckey continues to be a pest to The Team, specifically for bringing in reporters in a crime scene while at the same time blurting out their findings.
- Frivolous Lawsuit: Ashley's family pursues one against the city because the infection was spread at a public playground.
- Grandparent Favoritism: Both of Ashley's parents, particularly her mother, prefer their young granddaughter over their irresponsible daughter. Her father even explaining that her birth motivated him to stop drinking.
- Halfway Plot Switch: The first half of the episode is the detectives trying to find Sierra (who is initially believed to have been kidnapped), then looking for her body after evidence emerges that Ashley disposed of it. The second half switches to the vaccination plot and the prosecution of Stewart.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Ashley. Sadly, motherhood didn't really change it...and losing her daughter made her even worse.
- Hope Spot: After Monica Stewart is acquitted, Ashley's father helps her see that there is hope for the future and that the best thing she can do now is to live a life her daughter would be proud of, and it seems that Ashley is taking this to heart and that while she'll never get over losing her child, she's on a path where she can start to heal and move on with her life, and may even even come out of this as a better person. Then Ashley's mother, hell-bent on revenge, gets involved...
- The Illegal: Fin and Stabler encounter a couple of these while searching for Sierra.
- Jerkass Has a Point: For all of Monica Stewart's faults, she's not exactly wrong in saying that Ashley was a horrible mother. But since Ashley's failures as a mother are not the reason Sierra died, her point is ultimately worthless.
- Karma Houdini Warranty: Monica Stewart may not have been charged with the criminally negligent homicide of Sierra Walker due to her unvaccinated son who had measles playing at a park while he was highly contagious but she ends up getting the shock of her life when Ralph Walker, goaded by his wife and daughter acting horribly, Ate His Gun in front of her eyes.
- Lack of Empathy
- Disturbingly, Dale Stuckey is excited at the prospect of locating a dead toddler. When he then cheers at the little girl's remains being discovered whereas everyone else on the scene is horrified, Stabler angrily calls him out for his callousness which actually shocks Stuckey.
- Stewart seems largely unconcerned with the fact that a baby died from measles that she had contracted from Stewart's son. Considering that it's more or less her fault that the baby died, it's downright callous to see her act like that.
- Maternally Challenged: Ashley Walker, who would rather party and hang out with friends than raise her daughter.
- My God, What Have I Done?: During Stewart's trial, she claims that Sierra died because Ashley was a neglectful mother; leading Ashley to have such a moment after the verdict.
- Never My Fault: Stewart denies beyond all reason that the reason Sierra died is because Stewart didn't vaccinate her son and then took him to a park. Apparently she did keep him home after he became ill, but one of the major problems with measles is that it's highly contagious even before the onset of symptoms.
- The Ophelia: Ashley's first Unwitting Pawn for her daughter's kidnapping is a woman who thinks a doll is her son.
- Outliving One's Offspring: Sierra Walker's death via measles causes her surviving mother and grandparents (particularly the grandmother) to go after the mother of the child who infected her.
- Patched Together from the Headlines: The episode starts off being one about an irresponsible young mother who is reported for a "trunk that smells like death" by her own mother after her daughter goes missing, like the 2008 death of Caylee Anthony
. It then ends up being about whether or not people have the right to refuse to vaccinate their children. - The Plague: If unvaccinated, Measles could be a serious problem. Sierra Walker's death proves it.
- Replacement Goldfish: Ashley's babysitter carries around a doll as a "replacement" for her own son who died.
- Ripped from the Headlines: Based on public debate over "anti-vax" parents.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Had Monica not had her unvaccinated son playing at a public playground, the death never would have happened.
