If you're having an affair, pay in cash

May 27, 2011 2:58 PM

"...you never know when you'll commit a crime of passion and its just easier if they can't prove you drove to Jersey that day" and other things I learned from Law and Order
posted by the young rope-rider (50 comments total)

Personally, I'll be making sure I never let my children attend Hudson University. I'll also never work there, date someone who attends/works there, or wander onto campus.
posted by lesli212 at 3:08 PM on May 27, 2011 [17 favorites]

I will never get a job loading boxes off trucks.
posted by bleep at 3:10 PM on May 27, 2011 [17 favorites]

I will never be notably more famous than the other suspects.
posted by Trurl at 3:16 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

The main thing I learned is that murder victims in NYC are overwhelmingly upper-middle-class white people. Upper-middle-class white people really should avoid that city, because they're probably goners if they live or visit there.
posted by craichead at 3:16 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

The one really useful thing that L&O teaches is always, always, always lawyer up no matter what.
posted by Huck500 at 3:16 PM on May 27, 2011 [9 favorites]

Always lawyer up. Buy your body disposal kit now, before you even meet someone you may murder someday; they'll have a harder time proving premeditation.
posted by BrotherCaine at 3:19 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

If they haven't caught me after a week, they wont.....the people over at Cold Case will though...and play like 5 minutes of some song at the end of things.
posted by nile_red at 3:20 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

Also, give divorce a real chance before assuming you have to kill your spouse.
posted by bleep at 3:21 PM on May 27, 2011 [10 favorites]

>_{Don't google ways to kill someone before you kill someone.
   >>better yet. destroy your hard drive after you commit your crimei think i
      ...
         >>know how (1) erase (2) magnet (3) crush under heavy object (4) throw in incenerator to burn up.}

This is somewhat bad advice. The data Google searches is on Google's servers. What you should do is use Bing to search how to murder people, as the cops would never think to look there!

Actually what you should do is use a proxy to do your searches, then follow that up by using truecrypt to keep your hard drive encrypted at all times, so you don't even have to worry about destroying it (though overwriting it several times with random data should be enough)
posted by delmoi at 3:21 PM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

Big L&O fan, and most of what is here is right on, but this was badly executed, just a mess to read. Fun. but a single link blog rehash is just r
arely barely FPP worthy.
posted by timsteil at 3:29 PM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

Even if it seems unlikely, if there's a woman in the picture at all, she's guilty of the crime. Never mind the statistics.
posted by RedEmma at 3:32 PM on May 27, 2011 [4 favorites]

The main thing I learned is that murder victims in NYC are overwhelmingly upper-middle-class white people. Upper-middle-class white people really should avoid that city, because they're probably goners if they live or visit there.

Nah, they're just the only victims the cops take the time to look into.

For me, I learned that most jobs will allow you to be publicly questioned by the police while carrying out your duties of employment.
posted by Navelgazer at 3:37 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

If you beat the rap for a murder you committed, don't be smarmy. Smarmy people get a bullet in the gut on the courtroom steps.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 3:43 PM on May 27, 2011 [6 favorites]

Oh, man. Law and Order is responsible for my parents' marital happiness. For as long as I can remember, my parents have watched Law and Order. Every Wednesday at 9, we kids had to be in bed before the first DUH DUH. It was their thing. It was comforting, in a way.

And then, recently, my mom and I were talking, and I mentioned how devoted she and my father were to Law and Order. "What?" she said, confused.

"Every Wednesday, you know. We had to go to bed early."

"Oh." She blushed. "Well."

And then I realized that you don't end up with five kids unless you decide that Wednesday is Boning Night.
posted by punchtothehead at 3:54 PM on May 27, 2011 [146 favorites]

For me, I learned that most jobs will allow you to be publicly questioned by the police while carrying out your duties of employment.

Yes, also that it's totally normal to be anywhere on the spectrum from nonplussed to annoyed to rude when being questioned by two detectives about someone you know being killed.
posted by sweetkid at 3:55 PM on May 27, 2011 [5 favorites]

THAT WEB PAGE
LOOKS MORE LIKE
THEY LEARNED THINGS
FROM REDDIT
posted by koeselitz at 4:25 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

Something I've observed about police procedurals: the person you meet fairly early on in the show who gives you a small piece of information/let's you into an apartment/is there while someone else is being talked to but isn't really all that important will be the murderer.

Knowing this has made it less fun to watch these shows.
posted by sciencegeek at 4:28 PM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

I learned that women have an almost supernatural ability to manipulate men into committing crimes.
posted by googly at 4:29 PM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

I'm thinking you shouldn't wait until after you've committed the crime to get rid of your hard drive. Do it before you kill the person, or gift the computer to someone else years before the murder and visit them, adding suspicious searches (Google: chloroform sulfuric acid body disposal) and links to their internet history.
posted by misha at 4:32 PM on May 27, 2011

Every single defence attorney is a lying, manipulative, weasel scumbag.
posted by bwg at 5:11 PM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

FYI if you back your hard disk up with time machine to some cloud based storage service know that the police can search the backup without a warrant if the provider complies.
posted by humanfont at 5:12 PM on May 27, 2011

Also, don't allow Elizabeth Rohm anywhere near your case, and not because she's a lesbian.
posted by sweetkid at 5:20 PM on May 27, 2011 [6 favorites]

I think it would be a really great meta-commentary on "assumption of guilt" if, in one of the L&O shows, we get the big-name guest star, so they're *clearly* the kidnapper/killer/rapist, even though at first the script does its usual thing of trying to make it look like it wasn't them, and then it makes it look like they're covering for someone else, when of course we, as the audience, know they're guilty, because they're the big-name guest star! The proof is irrefutable (DNA doesn't lie!), everything goes to trial, we get big dramatic speeches, and then... previously undiscovered evidence brought to light at the last minute proves it wasn't the big-name guest star! The didn't do it! They weren't even covering for anyone! They'd been protesting their innocence all along, but WE DIDN'T BELIEVE THEM!

Shame on us. Shame on us all.
posted by tzikeh at 5:48 PM on May 27, 2011 [4 favorites]

I learned you can do the Couch Potato Workout while watching Law & Order.
posted by bentley at 5:54 PM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

The prep schools of Manhattan draw only three kinds of students: rich, beautiful sociopaths; murderously jealous scholarship students; and parent-resenting clubbers who get too close to the counterculture of the week.
posted by Iridic at 6:11 PM on May 27, 2011 [7 favorites]

Law & Order SVU has taught me that half of the male characters in Weeds are actually depraved criminals (see: Andy, Silas and Shane Botwin).
posted by giraffe at 6:12 PM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

The downside of driving to Jersey is the actual being in Jersey. If not for that, it's the perfect alibi.
posted by tommasz at 6:26 PM on May 27, 2011

- Trials never last more than thirty minutes.

- Investigation is a process of arresting two or three people in succession, until the last one confesses. This process can continue halfway into the trial of the second suspect.

- It's better to call in sick during sweeps, as you will inevitably be taken hostage, involved in a car accident, or accused of a crime you did not commit.
posted by Kevin Street at 6:33 PM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

My wife naps to L&O, and has for years, to the point that the opening theme sends her instantly to sleep, and the end music wakes her up. It's convenient for her, and annoying for me, because I inevitably sit down to watch the episode she's sleeping to and lose an hour.
posted by Huck500 at 6:38 PM on May 27, 2011 [4 favorites]

Cops should lie on the stand while testifying during a case. i did'nt lie on the stand during my years as a city police officer, the defense lawyer made me look foolish more than one time. the smart lawyers can twist actions around in a second.
posted by taxpayer at 6:43 PM on May 27, 2011

The prep schools of Manhattan draw only three kinds of students: rich, beautiful sociopaths; murderously jealous scholarship students; and parent-resenting clubbers who get too close to the counterculture of the week.
posted by Iridic at 8:11 PM on 5/27

To be fair, this is also the concept of the television program Gossip Girl.

Law & Order SVU has taught me that half of the male characters in Weeds are actually depraved criminals (see: Andy, Silas and Shane Botwin
posted by giraffe at 8:12 PM on 5/27

To be fair, this is also the concept of the television program Weeds.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:13 PM on May 27, 2011 [3 favorites]

Criminal Intent taught me that Goren knows everything and that just talking to him will get you to confess eventually.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 8:58 PM on May 27, 2011 [4 favorites]

Criminal Intent taught me that Goren knows everything and that just talking to him will get you to confess eventually.

Goren knows how to tell you want you want to hear. Goren knows you better than you know yourself.

Also, this thread made me watch 3 Criminal Intent eppys in a row on Netflix streaming. I had no idea the f'ed up art gallery forgery one was only the second ep of the whole series!
posted by sweetkid at 9:13 PM on May 27, 2011

Personally, I'll be making sure I never let my children attend Hudson University. I'll also never work there, date someone who attends/works there, or wander onto campus.

Two friends of mine in college were huge SVU fans. They made themselves Hudson University t-shirts, wore 'em all over campus. I really should ask them whether they ever took 'em to NYC.
posted by Tomorrowful at 10:14 PM on May 27, 2011

...also, I just learned that Cliff Huxtable went to Hudson's medical school.
posted by Tomorrowful at 10:16 PM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

Hey listen, buddy. Those boxes aren't going to unload themselves.
posted by brundlefly at 10:43 PM on May 27, 2011 [4 favorites]

fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit: "Criminal Intent taught me that Goren knows everything and that just talking to him will get you to confess eventually."

Even to shit you didn't do.
posted by bwg at 3:20 AM on May 28, 2011

Lessons from the L&O franchise...
- If you lawyer-up, you're guilty. Or, at the very least, highly suspicious.
- If you insist on a warrant before allowing a search of your home, you're guilty.
- If you have a prior record...for anything...you're a bad, bad person and probably guilty.
- Artists are for laughing at.
- If those brownshirts from SVU even think you might remotely be a suspect, they will ruin your life.
- The SVU brownshirts wipe their asses with the Constitution.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:48 AM on May 28, 2011 [8 favorites]

I think it would be a really great meta-commentary on "assumption of guilt" if, in one of the L&O shows, we get the big-name guest star, so they're *clearly* the kidnapper/killer/rapist, even though at first the script does its usual thing of trying to make it look like it wasn't them, and then it makes it look like they're covering for someone else, when of course we, as the audience, know they're guilty, because they're the big-name guest star! The proof is irrefutable (DNA doesn't lie!), everything goes to trial, we get big dramatic speeches, and then... previously undiscovered evidence brought to light at the last minute proves it wasn't the big-name guest star! The didn't do it! They weren't even covering for anyone! They'd been protesting their innocence all along, but WE DIDN'T BELIEVE THEM!

Shame on us. Shame on us all.

That's the plot to every Perry Mason. Especially the movies from the 90's.
posted by gjc at 5:08 AM on May 28, 2011

The first suspect is almost always a red herring.
posted by bwg at 5:44 AM on May 28, 2011

Even if it seems unlikely, if there's a woman in the picture at all, she's guilty of the crime. Never mind the statistics.

I learned that women have an almost supernatural ability to manipulate men into committing crimes.

This drives me crazy. I had to stop watching all of L&O's because of it. Although, if I do happen on to an episode, sometimes I'll keep watching in the hopes that it wasn't the male suspect's wife, ex-wife, girlfriend, daughter, sister, female boss, female cousin, etc, but it always is.
posted by nooneyouknow at 5:44 AM on May 28, 2011

I think what it all boils down to is this: Liking Law and Order will not prevent them from towing your car when they're filming on your block.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 6:30 AM on May 28, 2011 [2 favorites]

Most people visiting Central Park are murdered. Near or in in tunnels. Tunnels of death we now call them.
posted by cccorlew at 7:47 AM on May 28, 2011 [1 favorite]

Liking Law and Order will not prevent them from towing your car when they're filming on your block.

Or prevent Katherine Erbe from giving you the side eye if you look at her too long in recognition when you see her round the neighborhood.
posted by sweetkid at 1:16 PM on May 28, 2011 [1 favorite]

Dick Grayson attended Hudson University. Thus, I conclude that L&O takes place in the DC multiverse, and I hope to see some cameos in the next Crisis event.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 1:45 PM on May 28, 2011

I really really don't like Law and Order. Oh and Dick Wolfe is a fascist.

So I guess I've learned 2 things about Law and Order.
posted by thsmchnekllsfascists at 10:51 AM on June 2, 2011

Heh. A small Sam Waterston news item at the AV Club generated an oddly plausible episode of L&O in the comments section.
posted by Iridic at 9:34 AM on June 3, 2011 [3 favorites]

Hilarious. That may deserve it's own FPP, Iridic.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 1:55 PM on June 3, 2011

I contributed a vignette or two myself, so it's no-go under the self-linkage rules.
posted by Iridic at 2:08 PM on June 3, 2011

Holy cow, Iridic. That thread is priceless.
posted by brundlefly at 3:12 PM on June 3, 2011