| “ | Too bad about the kid. I hear she's a real nice piece of ass. | „ |
| ~ Ricky Yao |
| “ | These people are gonna be deported. I'm helping them stay in this country! | „ |
| ~ Roger Baker |
I took a pretty long break from PE proposals, but I've decided to get back at it and I think it's time to try and tackle a lot of the remaining PE candidates from the Law & Order/Chicago franchise. Due to similarity between a lot of the villains in the series, there's room for double and even triple proposals. The one we'll be starting with covers Ricky Yao and Roger Baker, and while they both have a relatively small appearance in only one episode, together they are a huge reason why the heinous standards of this franchise are so insane.
What's the Work?[]
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit is a police procedural drama set in the Law & Order/Chicago franchise, specifically focusing on the NYPD Special Victims Unit, which is assigned to sexual based offenses and led by Sergeant Olivia Benson.
Who are Ricky Yao and Roger Baker? What Have They Done?[]
At some point in the past, Ricky Yao became the owner of a Chinese Snakehead syndicate which exploited women via human trafficking. The method of his syndicate would be to find Chinese women and manipulate them by saying they could get a better life in the United States. They would often get picked up by immigration customs, and Ricky's solution to this was to work with corrupt lawyer Roger Baker. While in holding, Roger would approach the women and offer to bail them out, and say that they could begin working for Ricky in order to pay back the cost of bail. This involved either physical work at a sweatshop or sex work if the women were considered attractive. This went on for years, with around one-hundred women being trafficked every year. In 2004, a woman named Jiao Wu asked Ricky if he could get her daughter Ping Wu to the United States, which agreed to do after she paid him $50,000. Despite being fifteen, when Ping arrived Ricky forced her to do sex work. Jiao threatened to report this to the police, and Ricky proceeded to slit her throat, burying her body under concrete in the garage of a house that they claim to be repainting. With Jiao dead, her sister Li Mei was forced to pay off her debt. Jiao had two other daughters who were left in her apartment, resulting in the police arriving to perform a wellness check. Detectives Elliot Stabler and Olivia Benson begin investigating her disappearance and after speaking to Li Mei they believe Jiao was killed for not making her payments on time. Li Mei is beaten by Ricky after he learns she spoke to the police, and sends her a photo of Ping in prostitution to scare her into not complying with the police.
When it seems like Li Mei won't help them, Stabler brings her to a room with the numerous dead bodies connected to the syndicate, telling her that will never stop if she doesn't help them. This shocks her out of her fear and she agrees to do a sting operation. Li Mei goes to Ricky to give him the money for the next payment, at which point the police enter to arrest him for extortion. They interrogate Ricky, who proceeds to make sexual remarks towards Benson, but the police discover Jiao's body and charge Ricky with murder. They try to offer him a plea deal, but he refuses and says that Ping will be killed if he's not let go. To prevent him from getting a phone, Stabler misfiles paperwork to have Ricky sent to a facility in Attica. This gives them more time to find Ping, the officers go to Ricky's prostitution ring and bust it, although Ping is not present. The prostitutes there explain they were funneled into it by Roger Baker, who is arrested for his involvement. He sells out Ricky and gives the detectives the location of the brothel where Ping is being held. Due to the misfile being seen as unfair treatment, Ricky is let out prior to the trial, and immediately orders Ping's murder upon his temporary release. The officers arrest Ricky once again for doing this and track down the location of his brothel to save Ping. The episode ends there, but it's stated the only thing preventing Ricky from being charged was their leverage with Ping, so with her saved there's nothing left to help either him or Roger and they were presumably prosecuted afterwards with impunity.
Mitigating Factors[]
Pretty much nothing. Despite working alongside each other, they are far from Partners in Crime since Roger is just a morally corrupt individual willing to work for someone as sick and twisted as Ricky Yao. We don't even see them interact on-screen and Roger turns against Ricky to save himself the first chance he gets after being arrested. And with that potential redeeming quality squashed, these two have got nothing. Ricky sometimes puts up an affable persona, but it's just to manipulate women into immigrating so he can sell them into prostitution. Roger is basically the definition of two faced, he seems like a normal lawyer but he's actually a morally corrupt sociopath. No true affability, no care for each other beyond profit, these two wanted nothing but to make money off trafficking and to look out for themselves.
Heinous Standards[]
While trafficking is unfortunately quite common in this franchise, especially in SVU, and these guys are running a large operation, which means a lot of resources. However, none of that really matters because these two are perhaps the absolute worst traffickers in terms of numbers in the franchise, having 100 victims. Per year. They are basically the reason the heinous standards are so high when it comes to trafficking. We see a room full of bodies that are connected to the syndicate, victims that are trafficked are either forced to work in sweatshops in order to pay off their debt or forced into prostitution regardless of age. None of this is offscreen villainy, we see the bodies, we see the women working in the sweatshops, we see the brothel with the prostitutes, everything is extremely clear cut. Ricky is the leader of the operation so obviously all of this is a result of his decisions, and Roger is an essential part, because the victims of the trafficking ring have their bail paid by Roger and sent to Ricky's sweatshops and/or brothel, meaning it literally couldn't exist without Roger, therefore both are intrinsic to the operation and equally heinous.
Final Verdict[]
Absolute yes, these two set the heinous standards for trafficking crimes in the Law & Order franchise, manipulating hundreds if not thousands of women to immigrate to the United States so they can be forced to work in sweatshops or as prostitutes under the threat of death.