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| “ | I told them how you confessed to me about murdering the baby... I told them how you called me that night so scared and desperate, needing your mother... You were sobbing, eaten up with guilt and shame. Remember, April, how I told you we would get through it as a family? When I testify, the jury is gonna love it. | „ |
| ~ Lorraine Dillon bragging to her daughter April Troost about getting the best of her. |
Lorraine Dillon is the secondary antagonist of the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Design" and the Law & Order episode "Flaw". She is a con artist who swindles wealthy men with the help of her daughter and partner-in-crime, April Troost.
She was portrayed by Lynda Carter.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Lorraine is a career criminal who makes a living marrying wealthy men and cheating them out of their money. She has a daughter, April Troost, by her first husband, Douglas McManus, whom she divorced while pregnant with April because he did not have the money to keep her in the lifestyle she aspired to. She used April in her scams virtually from birth, and taught her how to manipulate and use people, particularly men. She brought April up with the help and money of several husbands, all of whom were stepfathers to the girl. She also worked diligently to make sure her daughter did not pick up "bad habits" such as caring about other people. Above all, she taught April that anyone who "let themselves" be taken advantage of deserved whatever they got.
When April was 14, she got pregnant, and Lorraine's then-husband sent her away to an unwed mother's home to prevent Lorraine from ruining another child. April killed the baby, a boy with severe birth defects, soon after he was born, and confessed to Lorraine in an uncharacteristic fit of remorse. Lorraine reassured April that they would get through the trauma together, while holding on to the secret to use as leverage against April, whom she could sense was even more ruthless and cold-blooded than she was.
"Design"[]
Detectives Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler of the NYPD's Special Victims Unit investigate April for a scheme in which she had been drugging and sexually assaulting wealthy, talented men to steal their sperm, and defrauding several childless couples after getting pregnant by offering to give them her baby, only to disappear with their money. After April fakes her own death in a car accident, Lorraine shows up at the SVU precinct, surprising Benson and Stabler, April having told them that her mother was dead. Lorraine takes them to a safe deposit box with April's personal effects in it, only to find in it a picture of April's latest victim, Barclay Pallister, whom April had accused of rape.
When Benson and Stabler find April alive and well, they arrest her for fraud. She tells forensic psychiatrist George Huang that April raised her to be a con artist. Lorraine confronts her, accusing her of lying, and demands that she tell them where to find the baby. April simply laughs at Lorraine, who tells her daughter she is dead to her and storms out.
April eventually makes a deal with Assistant District Attorney Casey Novak in which she gives up the location of the baby in return for staying out of prison. She leads Benson and Stabler to a train station, where they find Lorraine in the middle of scamming a ticket agent for a free train ticket. Lorraine then hands them the baby, and walks away. Benson and Stabler realize that Lorraine and April were manipulating them the entire time, but are powerless to do anything about it, as Novak cannot undo her deal with April and there is not enough evidence to charge Lorraine with anything.
"Flaw"[]
Soon afterward, Lorraine and April work with another con artist named Patrick Sullivan, who had once been Lorraine's lover. The three of them defraud record company executive David Glass of $500,000, and April shot Sullivan dead in order to keep his share of the money. To cover her tracks, April told Lorraine that Sullivan had sexually abused her when she was 14, back when he and Lorraine were lovers, and that she had killed him in a fit of rage when he tried to hurt her again.
With Benson's help, Detectives Joe Fontana and Ed Green of the NYPD's 27th Precinct find evidence connecting Lorraine and April to the murder, but Lorraine surprises them by claiming that she killed Sullivan in self-defense after confronting him about his supposed abuse of her daughter. During her trial, Lorraine claims to have killed Sullivan to avenge her daughter's rape and save her own life. When April testifies, however, she turns on her mother by saying that her relationship with Sullivan was consensual, and that she only said he had raped her to protect Lorraine. An enraged Lorraine protests that April killed Sullivan, but the jury does not believe her and finds her guilty of second-degree murder.
After Benson digs into April past and talks to the father of the baby she murdered, however, she and Assistant District Attorneys Jack McCoy and Alexandra Borgia set up a trap to finally put April in prison. McCoy and Borgia make a deal with Lorraine in which she tells them what she knows about the baby's death and in return for a reduced sentence. Benson then arrests April and tells her she knows about the baby, and Lorraine walks into the interrogation room and stares down her daughter, telling her she told the police and the DA's office what April had confessed to her about killing the child. She smiles triumphantly at April and says that she is going to testify against her, and that the jury is going to love her. Finally defeated, April agrees to give Benson a full confession. Lorraine is then sentenced to 20 years in prison, while April is imprisoned for life.
External links[]
- Lorraine Dillon on the Law & Order Wiki
