Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (TV Series)

Mood (2017)

Mariska Hargitay: Lieutenant Olivia Benson

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Quotes 

• Savannah Ross : Fourteen years living in other people's houses, sleeping in other people's beds... you know what you pray for most? A new lightbulb. It's crazy, right? But the other one kept burning out because I was too scared to shut it off.

  Olivia Benson : I'm so sorry.

  Savannah Ross : You know what's worse than being scared? Being pitied. Yeah, I should have told you that I already reported it to other cops. What's the point? People like you don't believe people like me.

  Olivia Benson : I believe you, Savannah. I believe you.

• Olivia Benson : Tracy Montgomery was a cashier who worked at a Chevron station at a minimart. She claimed she was raped at gunpoint by three guys in the storage closet.

  Odafin Tutuola : Only the cash register receipts showed she made six sales during the time of that attack.

  Olivia Benson : So I could have blown it off and I probably should have blown it off, but the bottom line is the truth of what her two cousins were doing to her from the time she was three years old, was far worse than anything she could have made up. Sometimes girls like Tracy, girls like Savannah, need to make up fairy tales just to get through the day.

• Olivia Benson : You're supposed to call us.

  Detective Dal Santo : I would have if she hadn't made the whole thing up. I did you guys a favor.

  Olivia Benson : Okay, a favor would have been letting us interview her, do a rape kit before two weeks passed.

  Detective Dal Santo : [to Rollins]  She always this pleasant?

  Olivia Benson : Hey, you want to find out?

• Olivia Benson : Okay, well, false rape accusations don't come out of thin air.

  Amanda Rollins : Except when they do.

  Olivia Benson : That's not how we work, Amanda.

• Michelle Morrison : This is all pro forma. Just think of it as...

  Olivia Benson : A conversation? If I had quarter for every time I've used that line.

• Amanda Rollins : Why don't you just tell us what happened?

  Detective Dal Santo : Look, a girl comes in, hung over. The whole time she's telling me what went down, she's looking back at her boss, like she's checking to see if he's listening.

  Olivia Benson : Yes, that's normal. Because she'd just went through the most traumatic experince of her life. She doesn't need an audience.

  Detective Dal Santo : Believe me, I get it. I have two daughters. That's why I told her boss to head back to the store, said I'd take it from there.

  Amanda Rollins : What did she say?

  Detective Dal Santo : I had her go over the details again. Suddenly it's "maybe this happened", "maybe he did this." I pushed a little, like we do, and that's when she said "Maybe I dreamed the whole thing."

  Amanda Rollins : You're kidding.

  Detective Dal Santo : Her exact words. I heard a lot of stories on the job, but that was definitely a first.

  Olivia Benson : 'Cause maybe you pushed too hard. And maybe that's why you're supposed to call us.

• Olivia Benson : You know, I know that you had it rough. Couldn't have been easy growing up in foster homes. But a lot of kids grow up in foster care. And a lot of kids have crappy lives.

  Savannah Ross : And a lot of them grow up to run for Congress or win Nobel Prizes in physics.

  Olivia Benson : Exactly, because they stopped seeing themselves as victims, so they stop being victims. Savannah, your life is far from over.

• Dominick Carisi Jr. : Hey, we got a DNA hit on the inhaler. It matches a hair that was found at the scene of a burglary that happened in Brooklyn last year.

  Olivia Benson : No rape?

  Dominick Carisi Jr. : Right.

  Amanda Rollins : Well, it wouldn't be the first time a perp changed lanes.

• Michelle Morrison : [to Olivia]  When they found William Lewis, you'd beaten him to a bloody pulp with a bed rod.

  Olivia Benson : But what I realized when I finally got to the other side, when I knew that I was gonna live, when I knew that I was gonna be okay, was that I wanted more. More than the job, more than a relationship. The reason that I fought so hard to stay alive... was for Noah. And I hadn't even met him yet. So if you want to know what I'm guilty of, I'm guilty of being distracted. I'm guilty. I was on the phone. And I took my eyes off that boy for one second. That's what I did wrong.

• Savannah Ross : After it happened, I didn't want to be alone. That's why I went out drinking with my friends. And if that makes me a liar...

  Olivia Benson : It doesn't.

  Savannah Ross : Just feel so alone, you know?

  Olivia Benson : What about family? What about your parents?

  Savannah Ross : What about them? Look at me. Exhibit A, all the wonders of the New York City foster care system in all its glory.

• Amanda Rollins : We're being played, Liv.

  Olivia Benson : I'm telling you, there's something there.

  Amanda Rollins : Normally I'd agree with you, but look at her history. Savannah, she cried rape so she wouldn't lose her job. She cried rape because she didn't want to move. She played me, Liv. She couldn't afford her apartment so she cried rape so she could get a new one.

• Savannah Ross : Nobody believes me. I just have one of those faces.

  Olivia Benson : That's not true.

  Savannah Ross : You didn't believe me.

  Olivia Benson : That was 100% my fault. I made a mistake and I'm sorry.

  Savannah Ross : Can I get you something? I don't have anything to drink, but I have some cronuts. Not a croissant, not a donut. It doesn't know quite what it is. Just like me.