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| “ | I noticed her before with the other girls, just walking around. She stood out like a little princess. I offered her a ride. I just wanted to talk to her. She was so sweet and lovely. | „ |
| ~ Hedges talking about his victim. |
Tommy Hedges is the main antagonist of the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Appearances". He is a pedophile who rapes and murders nine-year-old Cherie Latham after watching computer-generated child pornography.
He was portrayed by Eric Thal.
Early life[]
By his own admission, Hedges has been sexually fixated on prepubescent girls for as long as he can remember. In 1995, he kidnapped and raped a 10-year-old girl in California, and in 1999 he kidnapped and raped a 13-year-old girl in Florida. He was arrested for the latter offense and served four years in prison.
Upon his release, he started taking chemical castration drugs to quiet his sexual urges. He was successful to the point that he was able to get a job at an advertising firm in New York City, commuting from Florida every week while tricking his parole officer into believing he worked from home as a telemarketer. His pedophilic fantasies began to resurface, however, when he found online computer-generated child pornography created by the virtual pornography company Cyberloves, Inc.
Though the pornography was technically legal because no actual children were being abused in it, Hedges tried to unsubscribe from the site because he feared he would be tempted to abuse another child, which would send him back to prison. However, the company kept sending him signup emails until Hedges finally gave in, stopped taking his medication, and started fantasizing about raping little girls once again.
He started stalking Cherie Latham, a nine-year-old contestant in a child beauty pageant, convincing himself that she "wanted it" because she was willingly dressing in skimpy bathing suits in the contest. He lured her into his car, where he raped, bound, and gagged her in imitation of his favorite Cyberloves video, "The Story of Janet." His plan went awry, however, when she choked to death on her own vomit. Panicked, Hedges put her body in a suitcase and left it in a bus terminal.
In "Appearances"[]
The NYPD's Special Victims Unit investigates Cherie's murder and determines that her killer is both undergoing sex offender treatment and trying to counteract it when DNA analysis of the semen found inside her reveals high levels of progesterone and synthetic testosterone. After finding Hedges' name on a sex offender registry and learning that his mother lives a few blocks away from the crime scene, Detectives John Munch and Fin Tutuola interview her and find synthetic testosterone in her trash, proving that he had been in New York in violation of his parole.
Detectives Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler interrogate Hedges, who claims he is innocent and that he takes the testosterone so he can have a normal, adult relationship. They tell him that the evidence against him is overwhelming and that, at a minimum, he is going back to prison for violating his parole. Hedges breaks down crying and confesses to killing Cherie, while blaming his actions on the pornography he accessed from Cyberloves.
When Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cabot decides to prosecute Cyberloves CEO Stanley Billings as an accessory to Cherie's murder, she uses Hedges as a witness to tell the jury how "The Story of Janet" influenced him to rape and murder Cherie. Billings' attorney, Barry Moredock, cross-examines him and gets him to admit that he enjoyed raping Cherie even though he knew it was wrong, and that it is his own fault that he committed the crime. The jury nevertheless finds Billings guilty, while Hedges is sentenced for 25 to life in prison.
External links[]
- Tommy Hedges on the Law & Order Wiki
