  |
This article's content is marked as Mature The page contains mature content that may include coarse language, sexual references, and/or graphic violent images which may be disturbing to some. Mature pages are recommended for those who are 18 years of age and older. If you are 18 years or older or are comfortable with graphic material, you are free to view this page. Otherwise, you should close this page and view another page. |
| “ | I never meant these young men any harm. | „ |
| ~ Keppler making excuses for sexually abusing young boys |
Dr. Gilbert Keppler is the main antagonist of the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Lead". He is a pediatrician who molested several young boys, including Jeff Lynwood.
He was portrayed by Lawrence Arancio.
Early life[]
Keppler was a pediatrician and a child molester who used his position to sexually abuse young boys. He victimized his own patients by inserting his finger into their rectums and masturbating them, all the while telling them that he was performing a medical procedure called "urethral milking".
One of his victims, a five-year-old boy named Jeff Lynwood who had seizures as a result of ingesting lead paint, suffered a seizure that left him with permanent brain damage. This was a direct result of Keppler's negligence; he had misdiagnosed the boy with epilepsy, when he in fact suffered from pica, a disorder that causes people to ingest non-edible objects and substances.
He managed to get away with it for years because his $9 million inheritance from his wealthy family afforded him the best lawyers that money could buy. Additionally, the HMO he worked for, Denslow Medical Group, made sure that any complaint was silenced by their legal team in order to keep profits up. In one incident, his nurse, Lillian Siefeld, tried to report him to the human resources department after a patient told her that Keppler had molested him, but Denslow's chief attorney, Logan Coldwell, threatened to have her fired and take away her pension if she said anything.
At the time of the episode, Keppler had molested at least 30 boys.
"Lead"[]
The NYPD's Special Victims Unit first encounters Keppler when one of his victims, Justin McTeague, reported his abuse, although he had previously falsely accused his math teacher to get out of trouble after the man caught him smoking marijuana. While Justin makes for an imperfect victim, however, his accusation gives Detectives Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler enough probable cause to investigate Keppler. They eventually find four other boys whom he molested, as well as DNA evidence linking him to two other molestation cases. When they go to Keppler's office to question him, they catch him in the act of abusing another patient and arrest him.
Assistant District Attorney Gillian Hardwicke prosecutes Keppler on four counts of aggravated sexual abuse; while he is guilty of dozens of other offenses, there is only conclusive evidence that he abused four boys. That evidence is overwhelming, however, and Hardwicke ultimately wins a conviction. Keppler is sentenced to 16 years in prison, although he is able to post a $500,000 bond that allows him to remain under house arrest until his sentence is set to begin. He hypocritically tells the trial judge, Barry Moredock, that he did not mean his victims any harm.
Moments after the verdict, however, Keppler's lawyer, Lionel Granger, announces that his client is suing the NYPD, claiming that SVU "let him" molest several boys by intentionally slowing their investigation after Justin accused him because they wanted to protect their case closure rate. Captain Ed Tucker of the Internal Affairs Bureau questions the entire SVU team, but he exonerates them after learning that Justin had made a false accusation, leaving the detectives no choice but to investigate Keppler at a more deliberate pace.
Meanwhile, Keppler returns to his townhouse after the sentencing, only to find Jeff, now an adult with borderline mental retardation, aiming a gun at him and demanding to know why he had abused him when he was a child. Keppler responded by calling Jeff names like "retard" and "imbecile", which made Jeff so angry that he opened fire on his abuser, although he only manages to hit him once. Upon seeing that Keppler is still alive, Jeff finds a golf club in Keppler's closet and beats him to death with it.
Benson and Stabler arrest Jeff, while Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cabot, who had worked with SVU years earlier and is now replacing Hardwicke on orders from District Attorney Jack McCoy, charges him with murder. Ultimately, however, she learns that Keppler's negligence led to Jeff's intellectual disability and allows him to plead insanity, thus sending him to a psychiatric hospital instead of prison.
External links[]
- Gilbert Keppler on the Law & Order Wiki
