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| “ | No broad in a black robe is gonna keep me from what's mine. | „ |
| ~ Roberts after a female judge issues him a restraining order |
Harry Shaw "Hank" Roberts is the main antagonist and title character of the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Pop". He is a domestic abuser who beats his wife and stepson and forces the latter to compete in "kid fight clubs".
He was portrayed by Adam Senn.
Early life[]
Hank married an older woman named Sandra and adopted her teenage son, Nicky, giving the boy his last name and insisting he call him "Pop". Almost immediately afterwards, however, he began abusing his wife and stepson, avoiding detection by hitting them where bruises would not show and threatening to throw them out on the street if they disobeyed him. After Hank was fired from his construction job, he got a new job as a cab driver that he hated. He took his aggression out on his wife and stepson, beating them even worse than usual.
He started taking Nicky to neighborhood fight clubs, where adults would place bets on their children and make them fight each other. He would reward Nicky for winning by raising his allowance and telling him he made him proud; conversely, he would punish Nicky for losing by beating him so severely that he often had to stay home from school. Sandra, meanwhile, remained willfully ignorant of the situation, convincing herself that Hank was a good man and a loving father.
In "Fight"[]
During one fight session, Hank goads Nicky into beating a younger boy, Ethan Gilbert, to death. Detective Elliot Stabler of the NYPD's Special Victims Unit finds Ethan's body and alerts his parents, who accuse a boy named Blake, who had been bullying Ethan, of killing him. When Stabler and Detective Fin Tutuola question Blake, he says that Ethan's uncle Joe was teaching him how to fight. Blake then directs them to a place in the nearby woods, where Joe and Hank are taking bets on a group of teenage boys - including Nicky - as they fight.
Stabler and Tutuola arrest Hank and Joe, and question Nicky, who denies that Hank put him up to beating Ethan. Stabler also questions Hank, who denies making Nicky do anything and gets aggressive with Stabler when the detective calls him what he is - a bully. Assistant District Attorney Gillian Hardwicke says that they only have enough evidence to charge Hank with promoting gambling, however, so Stabler is forced to let him go when Sandra shows up to take Hank and Nicky home. Stabler is convinced that Hank is beating Nicky, however, and surreptitiously gives the boy his business card.
That night, Hank finds Stabler's business card in Nicky's pocket and hits Nicky in the chest so hard that it leaves a deep bruise and barely able to move his arm. He then forces Sandra to punch him in the face so he can blame his injuries on Stabler as revenge for "disrespecting" him. He complains to Internal Affairs Detective Ed Tucker, who dislikes Stabler almost as much as Stabler dislikes him, and who tries to charge him with using excessive force. That plan is ruined, however, when Nicky shows up at SVU's station house and tells Stabler that Hank has been beating him and his mother for years, caused his own injuries the night before, and made him beat Ethan to death. Hank and Sandra also go to the station house looking for Nicky, who tries to get Sandra to press charges, to no avail; Sandra, who is pregnant with Hank's child, still insists that he is a good man. Nevertheless, Nicky's accusations give Stabler and Tutuola enough evidence to charge Hank with domestic abuse, so they arrest him.
At Hank's arraignment hearing, the judge grants Hank bail, but forbids him to come within 200 yards of Sandra or Nicky. Stabler fears that Hank will come after them, however, so he and SVU Captain Donald Cragen go to Sandra's house that night to check on them. As they arrive, they hear a gunshot coming from the house, and rush inside. They find Hank dead from a gunshot wound to the head, while Nicky is cowering in the corner with a gun next to a bruised and battered Sandra.
After he is arrested, Nicky says that he killed Hank to stop him from beating Sandra. When Stabler examines the crime scene evidence, he discovers that Hank was in fact shot while in a kneeling position by a person who was standing over him - a person who could have been either Nicky or Sandra. Both say they killed Hank, however, and neither Stabler nor Hardwicke can find any evidence that proves that either one of them is lying. With no way to charge either one, and tacitly agreeing that Hank got what he deserved, Stabler and Hardwicke let Nicky and Sandra go.
External links[]
- Hank Roberts on the Law & Order Wiki
