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| “ | Now, you kill the sonofabitch if you have to, just do it! | „ |
| ~ Woodleigh ordering James Reberty to cut out Drew McDaniels' kidney |
Philip Woodleigh is the main antagonist of the Law & Order episode "Sonata for Solo Organ". He is a wealthy businessman who pays to have a man's kidney cut out against his will so his critically ill daughter can have a transplant.
He was portrayed by the late Fritz Weaver, who also portrayed The Chancellor in The Twilight Zone.
Early life[]
Woodleigh was a wealthy businessman and philanthropist with connections in the NYPD and New York City's political elite, including District Attorney Adam Schiff.
His daughter, Joanna, suffered from severe kidney disease as a result of drug abuse, and could not get a kidney transplant because she needed an exact match. Woodleigh tried to bribe Drew McDaniels, a man with just such a match, to donate his kidney to her, but McDaniels refused. Desperate to save Joanna, he paid James Reberty, a corrupt doctor, $1 million to get McDaniels' kidney by any means necessary, even if it meant killing him.
Reberty and his nurse and lover Ellen Hale attacked McDaniels, knocked him unconscious, and surgically removed his kidney, afterward stitching him up and letting go in Central Park. McDaniels staggered into a nearby hospital and passed out. Reberty and Hale then transplanted McDaniels' kidney into Joanna, who made a full recovery.
"Sonata for Solo Organ"[]
NYPD Homicide Sergeant Max Greevey and Detective Mike Logan investigate McDaniels' assault as an attempted murder. They trace the stolen kidney to "Mary Merritt", a common pseudonym for patients who don't want their condition publicized, and find out her real identity, realizing that she or someone close to her must have paid to have McDaniels' kidney forcibly removed.
Greevey and Logan look through the financial records of hospital employees and discover that Reberty has recently paid down his mortgage by $1 million, giving them probable cause to detain him and Hale for questioning. Hale, finally realizing that Reberty has been using her, incriminates him in assaulting and mutilating McDaniels, and Greevey and Logan arrest them both.
Executive Assistant District Attorney Ben Stone and Assistant District Attorney Paul Robinette charge Reberty and Hale with attempted murder, but Reberty offers to incriminate Woodleigh in exchange for a lesser sentence. Using the financial records of the transaction between Woodleigh and Reberty as probable cause, Stone has Woodleigh arrested and charges him, too, with attempted murder.
During the trial, Woodleigh testifies that he merely asked Reberty to do whatever he could to get a kidney and that he had no idea the organ was obtained through force; he also says that any father would have done what he did to save his child. Joanna, meanwhile, approaches Stone privately and tells him that her father never meant to hurt anyone, and that he has paid McDaniels and his family $1 million for their pain and suffering.
Sensing that they are losing the trial, Stone and Robinette question Reberty for more incriminating information to use against Woodleigh. Reberty supplies them with a tape recording he made of Woodleigh telling him to get McDaniels' kidney any way he can, including killing him. Stone plays the recording for the jury, who then find Woodleigh guilty of attempted murder. He is then sentenced to life in prison.
External links[]
- Philip Woodleigh on the Law & Order Wiki
