Law & Order: Trial by Jury (TV Series) Vigilante (2005) User Reviews

Suffers from heavy-handedness

[ltdab · 7/10 · 23 June 2014]

This episode has a strong premise. A sexual predator is released from prison on parole with chemical castration. The neighborhood resents his presence but is unable to keep him out since he has done nothing wrong during parole. The man seems reformed. Someone in the neighborhood takes matters into their own hands and shoots him. This premise immediately sets up the conflict between the rights of prior offenders versus the security of society.

Unfortunately the characters of the episode are exaggerated in such a way as so telegraph the ending, make the episode predictable, and leave little time for the interesting conflict that sets up the story. Each plot turn makes the story less and less morally ambiguous and the conflict a battle of right and wrong. The scripts ends up being more about a politically ambiguous defense attorney than the balance between the rights of individuals. Truly a wasted opportunity.

An often used theme

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 10 March 2013]

In both Law And Order prime and in SVU the theme of a self seeking political attorney with an agenda taking a case has been used many times on all Law And Order franchise shows. A good example of this is this third episode of Trial By Jury. Aiden Gillen, husband and father shoots down a known sex offender who had just been released from prison.

He gets immediate legal counsel from Lorraine Bracco who became a lawyer the hard way, studying and clerking at a storefront office and passing the bar. This is a fact she points out to Amy Carlson and she intends to show all the law school graduate types who get plugged into good jobs and firms what street lawyers can do.

Gillen is a hero for doing what he did to many and the case won't be easy for Bebe Neuwirth and Carlson to win. Still vigilante justice is not something the New York County DA countenances, they did in real life go after Bernhard Goetz.

But it might just be that Bracco might be doing a lot more than courtroom advocacy. Only if they can pry Gillen loose from his attorney can they prove anything. And tactics are a question as well.

One interesting climax here.