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| “ | Keith doesn't need protection from me. I'm the only one who loves him. | „ |
| ~ McCaskin about her underage lover |
Danielle McCaskin is the main antagonist the Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode "Tru Love".
She was played by Anne Dudek, who also portrayed Dawn Lin on NCIS: New Orleans, Emma Kerrigan in Criminal Minds, and Dr. Amber Volakis in House MD.
Biography[]
Early life[]
When Danielle was a teenager, she and her mother fled from her abusive father, forcing her to leave her high school, where she was very popular. Her emotional development was therefore arrested in adolescence, and she remained emotionally immature well into adulthood.
As an adult, she worked as a high school English teacher, and married stockbroker Jack McCaskin. She was still attracted to teenage boys, however, and eventually began an affair with one of her students, 16-year-old Keith Tyler.
Keith's father, plastic surgeon Grant Tyler, found out about his son's dalliance with Danielle and blackmailed her into having sex with him. He also recorded their trysts on a hidden video camera without her knowledge. After she found out about the camera, however, Danielle decided to kill Grant. She talked Keith into sabotaging his father's motorcycle, although Keith thought it would only injure Grant. The sabotage resulted in Grant flying off the bike and being fatally impaled on a fence.
In "Tru Love"[]
Danielle colludes with Keith to frame Jack for the murder. When Detectives Mike Logan and Megan Wheeler of the NYPD's Major Case Squad investigate Jack, they search his home and walk in on Danielle and Keith having sex. They take her into custody and charge her with statutory rape, even though Keith protests that they are in love.
However, Danielle later dyes her hair black and escapes with Keith, and they board a bus to Canada. When the bus driver sees them making out, however, he calls the local police, who in turn call in Logan and Wheeler.
Keith confesses to sabotaging the motorcycle in order to protect McCaskin, even though it will mean that he will be charged as an adult. Logan and Wheeler take Danielle on a tour of the prison Keith would be incarcerated in, which is full of violent, predatory felons. Danielle protests that Keith will never survive in prison, and blurts out, "He's just a kid!" - and then finally realizes that she had taken advantage of him. Danielle decides to plead guilty to all of the charges against her in order to save Keith and atone for what she did to him.
After she pleads guilty, she is sentenced to a year in prison and ordered to have no more contact with Keith, who believes he is her child's father. Following her sentence, however, Danielle reveals to a heartbroken Keith that Jack is the baby's father.
External links[]
- Danielle McCaskin at the Law & Order Wiki
