| “ | We're not racists. We just needed the money. | „ |
| ~ Janice explaining her motivation to Olivia Benson and Dana Lewis. |
Mark and Janice Whitlock are supporting antagonists in the Law & Order: Special Victim Unit episode "Raw". They are a married couple who adopt a young child purely so they can kill him for his life insurance policy.
Mark was portrayed by Myk Watford, who also portrayed Roach in Trailer Park of Terror, and Janice was portrayed by Marin Hinkle, who also portrayed Judith Harper-Melnick in Two and a Half Men and Jane Hartley in The Haunting of Molly Hartley.
Biography[]
Mark Whitlock worked as a corrections officer at Riker's Island prison in New York City. He and his wife Janice struggled financially and were forced to file for bankruptcy in 2003, leading them to come up with a plan to make more money. In 2004 they adopted a young African-American child named Jeffrey and insured his life for $750,000. They then contacted the Revolutionary Aryan Warriors (RAW), a white supremacist militant group led by Brian Ackerman, and they offered to give them a third of Jeffrey's insurance payment if they would kill him in a school shooting and make it look like a hate crime. Ackerman agreed to the deal and contracted Neo-Nazi Brannon Lee Redding to kill Jeffrey because Redding was a former inmate at Riker's, so if he was caught the crime could be blamed on a personal vendetta against Mark. The Whitlocks provided Redding with Jeffrey's school photo to help him identify the boy.
"Raw"[]
Redding carries out his instructions and shoots up Jeffrey's school with a sniper rifle, killing Jeffrey and wounding two other children whom he suspects of being Jewish. Mark and Janice feign grief at their son's death and Mark tells Detectives Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler of the NYPD's Special Victims Unit, who are investigating the crime, about the violence and death threats he faces from inmates at Riker's in order to misdirect the investigation.
After Redding is identified by the SVU, Mark is called down to the police station to be interviewed about him. He denies knowing Redding, explaining that Redding was imprisoned in a different cell block. Mark and Janice later attend Redding's plea hearing, where his plea deal is rejected and he agrees to testify against Ackerman, falsely claiming that he was the one who gave him Jeffrey's school photo. They can also later be seen in the crowd at Ackerman's trial, where his son Kyle assassinates Redding before being gunned down by Dana Lewis, an FBI agent undercover inside RAW.
After the courthouse shooting, Lewis successfully carries out a sting operation which results in RAW being raided by the FBI. During the raid, the FBI discover financial records showing that Mark Whitlock had promised the group $250, 000 - one-third of the life insurance policy on Jeffrey - from a future insurance payment. Lewis shows the evidence to Benson and the two of them confront Mark and Janice, pointing out that they filed their insurance claim almost immediately after they found out Jeffrey was dead and got rid of all their pictures of him and accusing them of giving Redding Jeffrey's picture. Janice admits to the crime but insists that they are not racist, but simply needed the money. Both Mark and Janice are then arrested for murder.
External links[]
- Mark Whitlock on the Law & Order Wiki
- Janice Whitlock on the Law & Order Wiki
