In the Criminal Justice System, sexually based offenses are considered especially heinous. In New York City, the dedicated detectives who investigate these vicious felonies are members of an elite squad known as the Special Victims Unit. These are their stories.
The Landlord of Grace Bontz, 39, led Detectives Olivia Benson and Fin Tutuola up the stairs to her apartment. Grace had none been seen for a few days, and a friend had called in her disappearance, and suggested she could have been rape. When they reached the door, the Landlord knocked on it.
"Ms. Bontz," he said. "Ms. Bontz, are you in there? I have two detectives here who would like to speak with you."
When no response came, Tutuola butted in.
"Open it up," he barked.
The Landlord nodded, took out his keys and unlocked the door for them. Benson and Tutuola entered the apartment, drawing out their guns. They separated and began searching rooms. Each room their searched was clear until Olivia entered the bedroom.
"Fin!" she called. "I've got something!"
Tutuola raced into the room with his gun pointing at the bed. Lying in a pool of blood was the body of Grace Bontz. She was completely naked except for a towel which covered her face.
"Looks like she was raped," Benson said before radioing the M.E., and CSU to come deal with the crime scene. After radioing them, Benson sat down on a chair in the living room, putting her head on her hands, seeming like she was going to breakdown. Fin came out from the bedroom and walked over to her.
"Liv, you okay?" he asked, putting a hand on her shoulder.
"This job just gets harder and harder without Elliot," she replied. "I'm fine though."
Within fifteen minutes, CSU and Medical Examiner (ME) Dr. Melinda Warner had arrived on the scene. Warner had a look at the victim while members of CSU looked around the crime scene for forensic clues.
"Looks like your victim was raped pre-mortem," Warner concluded to Benson and Tutuola.
"Cause of death?" asked Fin.
"Manual strangulation," Warner replied. "Thing is, there's something unusual about how she was killed."
"How so?" Olivia asked.
"It looks like two people were involved."
"How do you get that based off the strangulation?" Fin asked, flabbergasted.
"There's obvious marks on her neck where she was strangled, but there's also some marks on her chest to suggest she was held down from behind while she was strangled. I'll know for sure after a do a full body exam."
By the next day, Olivia and Fin had questioned Grace's father, brother, uncle and boyfriend and had cleared them all as suspects. None of them believed anyone had any reason to attack Grace, so the detectives were left with very little to go on. However, Warner called Olivia and told her she had found some things out about the victim. They drove to the ME's office and met with Warner.
"Like I said yesterday, there was a good chance there were two perps," Warner said.
"And?" Fin said.
"And it looks like I was right," Warner continued, walking over to the body of Grace and showing parts of her body. "See the bruising on her back and chest? It suggests to me she was held down by one of your perps while the other raped her. She suffered too before she died."
"How so?" asked Olivia.
"She was raped at least three different times. I found sperm in her throat, anus and vagina."
"Bastard raped her every way he could," Olivia said, clearly disgusted. Suddenly, her phone rang and she turned to answer it. "Benson," she answered while Fin continued talking to Warner.
"Do you have a time of death?" he asked.
"Based on body temperature, I estimate about twenty-four hours ago. She was possibly dead about four hours when you found her."
"Thanks, call us if you find anything else," Fin said.
Warner nodded and covered Grace's body again while Fin turned back to Olivia, who had a grave look on her face.
"What's up?" he asked.
"That was Munch. There's been another attack. We got two more victims to deal with."