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| “ | You know me - I never take 'no' for an answer. | „ |
| ~ Patton subtly intimidating Amanda Rollins. |
Deputy Chief Charles Patton is a supporting antagonist in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, appearing as a supporting antagonist in the episode "Pattern Seventeen" and as the main antagonist of the episode "Forgiving Rollins". He is a high-ranking police official who uses his power and clout with his fellow police officers to sexually abuse his female subordinates, including Detective Amanda Rollins.
He was portrayed by Harry Hamlin, who also portrayed Randall Bailey in Law & Order, Aaron Echolls in Veronica Mars and Cameron Kaiser in Batman: The Animated Series.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
Patton is the Deputy Chief of the Atlanta, Georgia Police Department, and commands a great deal of respect and loyalty from his fellow police officers, particularly fellow high-ranking officials. He uses his power and political connections to sexually abuse his female subordinates and intimidate them into silence. His typical pattern is to take his victims under his wing as a mentor and father figure, and then abuse their trust by threatening to ruin their careers if they do not submit to his sexual demands.
Detective Amanda Rollins was one of his victims when she worked in Atlanta. After mentoring her in her early career and pulling strings to make sure she was promoted to detective at a young age, he told her he could make her sister's arrest for check fraud go away if she slept with him. Rollins reluctantly agreed and met with him at a motel, but she withdrew her consent when he started getting rough with her. He ignored her pleas for him to stop, however, and overpowered and raped her. Rollins never told anyone about the assault, and quickly transferred to New York City to join the NYPD's Special Victims Unit to get away from him.
In "Pattern Seventeen"[]
Patton first appears when Rollins goes back to her old police department to find a rape kit related to the "Pattern Seventeen Rapist," who had been active in Atlanta before moving to New York City to rape women in a city where the police had no record of him. When neither Rollins nor her partner, Detective Fin Tutuola, can find the rape kit, Patton locates it for them and tells Rollins how good it is to see her, which makes her noticeably uncomfortable. After Rollins and her SVU colleagues catch the rapist, Albert Beck, Patton calls Rollins to congratulate her and invite her to visit him. When Rollins says she is too busy, Patton replies that "I never take no for an answer." Seeing Patton again brings back Rollins' trauma from the rape, which causes her to relapse into her gambling addiction.
In "Forgiving Rollins"[]
Months later, Patton visits New York to go to a police convention, along with his latest protégé, Detective Reese Taymor. After taking the credit for Beck's arrest, he goes back to the hotel where he and his department members are staying, where he talks his way into Taymor's room and then rapes her.
The next day, Taymor reports the rape, prompting the SVU detectives to investigate. The squad's Bureau Chief, William Dodds, meets with Patton to finesse the politically sensitive situation, pretending to be on Patton's side as he claims that he and Taymor had consensual sex and that Rollins has a grudge against him for ending their "affair". SVU Lieutenant Olivia Benson nevertheless finds enough evidence to prove Patton raped Taymor and arrests him.
Patton and his lawyer, John Buchanan, meets with Assistant District Attorney Rafael Barba to negotiate a deal in which he would plead guilty to disorderly conduct and pay a fine in return for no jail time and being allowed to take early retirement. When Barba refuses, Patton leaves indignantly while calling the ADA, who is Cuban-American, a "Spanish dandy". Barba presses ahead with the prosecution with Taymor as his main witness, but Patton's "good 'ol boy" charm and the public support of his wife, Vivienne, seem to sway the jury to his side.
Barba asks Rollins to testify about what Patton did to her, but Rollins refuses to admit that Patton raped her, not wanting to think of herself as a victim. She changes her mind, however, after Patton's right-hand man, Atlanta PD Captain Sam Reynolds - who had also made inappropriate advances to her back in Atlanta - accuses her of sleeping with Patton to advance her career and then betraying him because she did not get what she wanted. She testifies against Patton, who later has a panic attack while Barba cross-examines him and is briefly hospitalized. Realizing he is beaten, he pleads guilty to sexual abuse in the third degree, agreeing that, to avoid prison and keep his pension, he will retire, go on the sex offender registry, and never again seek employment in law enforcement.
External Links[]
- Charles Patton on the Law & Order Wiki
