Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (TV Series)

Rooftop (2001)

Christopher Meloni: Detective Elliot Stabler

Quotes 

• Fin Tutuola : Spent a lot of time on my rooftop when I was a kid. It was safe back then.

  Elliot Stabler : Doing the wild thing with your girlfriend?

  Fin Tutuola : You know, when you live here you can't afford a vacation to Aruba, so you went to "Isle of Aroofa." Tar Beach. Plus the guys like to come up here 'cause this is where the girls would come hang out.

  Elliot Stabler : I grew up in Queens. All I ever wanted was the excitement of the city. Sounds like all you ever wanted was quiet. We should've traded places.

• Elliot Stabler : [to Fin]  You okay?

  Fin Tutuola : Yeah. I just don't like some guy making my home turf dangerous for young girls.

  Elliot Stabler : I thought you grew up in Brooklyn.

  Fin Tutuola : Nope. About 10 blocks from here. Ground Zero for the '68 riots.

  Elliot Stabler : What was that like?

  Fin Tutuola : I was six. My mother said the only way we're leaving our apartment was if somebody burned it down.

• Elliot Stabler : [Stabler is sitting across the table from Leon]  So, how many little girls have you had sex with since you got out?

  Leon Tate : Hey, man, you ain't have no right to follow me.

  Elliot Stabler : Hey, hey, hey. Don't tell me how to do my job. Answer the question.

  Leon Tate : So you can put me away again for nothin'?

  Leon Tate : [shakes his head wordlessly] 

  Leon Tate : Hey, man, listen, the young ladies feel me. It's not my fault.

  Elliot Stabler : It is if they're jailbait.

  Leon Tate : They wanna pleasure me, who am I to stop them?

  Elliot Stabler : If you infect them with your H.I.V., it's their problem, too, right?

  Leon Tate : Look, man, you-you-you-you ambushed us before I even had an opportunity to tell her. I have protection.

  Elliot Stabler : [leans forward]  Her protection is me putting you back in your little cage.

  Leon Tate : W-w-w-why don't you just get off my case, man?

  Elliot Stabler : [shakes head slightly]  'Cause I don't like you.

  Leon Tate : [licks lips; shakes head]  Alright, well, I don't have nothing else to say 'til my legal aid gets here.

  Elliot Stabler : [makes a face and gets up] 

• Captain Donald Cragen : [to Stabler]  I don't remember telling you to tail Leon Tate.

  Elliot Stabler : I heard he was out. Just keeping my eye on him.

  Captain Donald Cragen : Well, this squad doesn't have enough bodies for you and your partner to go freelancing.

  Elliot Stabler : I'd like to think that we saved a young girl's life tonight.

  Captain Donald Cragen : And we would need a new unit if we were to follow every perv that we thought might repeat. Leon Tate did his time and until somebody makes a complaint, he has rights.

  Elliot Stabler : This guy's penis is a deadly weapon and he's got a thing for young girls. They got rights, too.

  Captain Donald Cragen : Until Cabot gives us the word, you back off. Are we clear?

• Elliot Stabler : [to a teenage girl about Leon]  You know Casanova here has HIV?

  Melissa : [to Leon]  That the truth?

  Leon Tate : Yo, man, don't believe them.

  Melissa : No. Is it the truth?

  Leon Tate : Yo, I got protection.

  Melissa : I don't care if you got a bulletproof vest for that thing. You should have told me.

  [walks away] 

• Fin Tutuola : Problem is, even if the woman lies about her age, it's still the man's fault.

  John Munch : Ignorance is no defense.

  Olivia Benson : Nashika Morris is 14. She's not a woman; she's a girl.

  Fin Tutuola : What's the guy supposed to do? Check the girl's birth certificate? I'm just as opposed to rape as everybody else in this room, but if she wanted to have sex, that's her choice. She wasn't forced.

  Elliot Stabler : She's a minor. What she wants isn't relevant.

  A.D.A. Alexandra Cabot : [as she and Dr. Huang walk into the squad room]  Are we interrupting?

  John Munch : Friendly disagreement.

• Dr. George Huang : [about the murderer]  Rape is about anger, but I'm not sure it's the women that set him off. I think following him might have made his anger boil over.

  Elliot Stabler : Oh, so Aisha Thompson's death is our fault?

• Elliot Stabler : [after another teenage girl is found murdered on a rooftop]  Well, if it's Leon's work, he's improvising.

  Dr. Melinda Warner : Couldn't have been Leon Tate.

  Elliot Stabler : What are you talking about?

  Dr. Melinda Warner : The victim's still in rigor. Probably killed this morning. Tate was dead by last night.

  [Stabler looks shocked] 

  Olivia Benson : Elliot...

  Elliot Stabler : I wanted it to be Leon.

  Olivia Benson : Everything fit.

  Elliot Stabler : We wasted time. Another girl's dead because I went down the wrong road.

• Alva Tate : [to Stabler]  You happy now?

  Elliot Stabler : Mrs. Tate, I'm sorry about Leon.

  Alva Tate : Don't you dare say you're sorry. You're glad he's dead. He didn't kill those girls, but you killed him anyway. You murdered him.

  Fin Tutuola : Mrs. Tate, Detective Stabler was doing his job.

  Alva Tate : My son was innocent.

  Fin Tutuola : Your son was gonna kill somebody with his HIV. We had to stop him. We didn't put the needle in his arm.

  Alva Tate : You didn't, but you all stick together, don't you?

  [walks away] 

  Elliot Stabler : Fin, thanks for taking my back with Mrs. Tate.

  Fin Tutuola : Leon was scum. He was gonna kill some innocent girl if you didn't stop him.

• Elliot Stabler : Well, my old man never approved of a single thing I ever did, I don't go around raping and killing young girls.

• Olivia Benson : [when the judge decides not to civily commit Leon Tate]  Judge was afraid to stick her neck out.

  Elliot Stabler : Maybe she'll change her mind when we wheel a body into her chambers.