Date: 26th January 2001

Wolf, NBC Tussle Over Law & Order Episode


Producer Dick Wolf on Thursday denounced the network's vow never to rebroadcast Wednesday night's episode of Law & Order, which had angered the National Puerto Rican Coalition and other Latino activist groups.

"The network has caved in to the demands of a special interest group, and I am extremely disappointed with this decision, about which I was not consulted, as I think it sets an extremely dangerous precedent," Wolf said in his statement. The episode, the highest-rated show on any network Wednesday night (12.7/19), concerned a murder that occurs at the annual Puerto Rican Day Parade in New York. It was presumably suggested by events at last year's parade in which dozens of women complained of being sexually harassed by men in the crowd, particularly around Central Park. In fact, Dateline NBC devoted a segment of its June 13th program to the occurrence and one week later devoted the entire program to it, featuring amateur videotape of some of the assaults and accounts by eyewitnesses.

In his statement, Wolf observed: "Law & Order has been ripped from the headlines for 240 episodes. ... Over the past 11 years, the series has offended the sensitivities of a variety of special interest groups." Besides promising not to repeat the episode, NBC reportedly told activists that it had directed its standards and practices department to address the issue of ethnic and racial "sensitivity" in order to prevent such programs from airing on the network in the future.

Source: Studio Briefing