“ | Sweetheart, you didn't have to sleep with him. | „ |
~ Lorraine making excuses for having her husband killed |
Lorraine Cobin is the main antagonist of the Law & Order episode "For Love Or Money". She is a wealthy socialite who pays to have her husband killed so she can inherit his money, and then murders the assassin she hired.
She was portrayed by Cathy Moriarty-Gentile.
Early life[]
Born Lorraine Strickland, her main ambition in life is to have rich men keep her in a life of luxury.
Lorraine was impregnated in her 20s by a boyfriend who walked out on her, and gave birth to a daughter, Melissa. She then married Nick Claussen, a well-to-do realtor, but left him four years later after the real estate market tanked. During the divorce, Lorraine and her corrupt lawyer, Ray Dimmick, manipulated Melissa into making false allegations that Neal had molested her in order to get a bigger settlement.
She then married Alan Cobin, the wealthy owner of an electronics store. While Alan loved her and treated Melissa like his own daughter, Lorraine was only interested in his money, and had several affairs.
Eventually, Alan grew tired of her cheating on him, and began planning to file for divorce. Fearing she would lose everything, Lorraine had Dimmick hire small-time criminal Ronald Buck to kill Alan and make it look like a robbery so she could inherit his money. Six months later, Buck tried to blackmail Lorraine, so she personally shot him dead.
In "For Love of Money"[]
While investigating Buck's murder, NYPD Homicide Detectives Lennie Briscoe and Ed Green discover that he murdered Alan, and talk to Lorraine, who says she has never heard of Buck or the carpet cleaning business he uses as a front for his scams. Eventually, however, Briscoe and Green find an invoice for $10,000, signed by Lorraine, made out to Buck's front company, and suspect that she hired Buck to kill Alan.
Executive Assistant District Attorney Jack McCoy and Assistant District Attorney Serena Southerlyn investigate Lorraine and learn of her history of conning wealthy men. They also find out that she paid a friend $50,000 to say she was with her at the time of Alan's death, and that she had been seen arguing with Buck shortly before his own murder. Briscoe and Green search Lorraine's house and find a parking stub for the lot where Buck's body was found, so they arrest her for murder.
Lorraine uses her daughter as an alibi for Buck's murder, and Melissa dutifully tells Southerlyn that she was with her mother that entire night. When McCoy and Southerlyn threaten her with perjury charges, however, Melissa admits that she had gone out for a few hours, which would have given Lorraine enough time to kill Buck and come back home by the time Melissa got back.
During the trial, Lorraine upends McCoy's case by claiming that Melissa killed Alan, all while hypocritically begging the jury to punish her, not her daughter. The ploy works, and Lorraine is found not guilty. Melissa finally sees her mother for who she is, however, and makes a deal with McCoy to wear a wire and get Lorraine to admit to killing Alan.
Lorraine and Melissa have champagne aboard Alan's yacht the next day, and Melissa condemns her mother for selling her out; Lorraine glibly replies that she would have protected her if something went wrong with her plan. When Melissa demands to know why she had Alan killed, Lorraine coldly dismisses the murder and her late husband as being "over with". Melissa then tells Lorraine to look at the dock, where McCoy is listening to their conversation, along with Briscoe and Green, who are waiting to arrest her. Lorraine calls her own daughter a "little bitch," to which Melissa replies, "I had a good teacher." Lorraine is then arrested for ordering Alan's murder, for which she is presumably found guilty and imprisoned.
External links[]
- Lorraine Cobin on the Law & Order Wiki
[]
Villains | ||
Law & Order Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Law & Order: Criminal Intent Law & Order: LA Law & Order: Organized Crime Law & Order: Toronto Law & Order: UK Homicide: Life on the Street Chicago Fire Chicago: Med Chicago P.D. FBI FBI: Most Wanted FBI: International |