During the investigation of a serial killer, Stabler discovers CSU detective O'Halloran's body in the lab with the screen showing that the killer's DNA matches CSU technician Dale Stuckey. He is held by Stuckey until Benson comes to the rescue in one of her most powerful performances in the finale's closing minutes.
In the heartbreaking season 17 finale, Benson gets entangled into a hostage situation with a corrupt corrections officer who rapes his inmates. She then blames herself for Dodds getting shot, but her look to the squad walking down the hallway at the hospital delivers the message of Mike's death in a touching finale that left audiences speechless and is one of Benson's most emotional episodes yet.
After leaving the show for a couple of episodes due to her pregnancy, Mariska Hargitay returns with a bang. Benson works undercover in an eco-terrorist group in Oregon and is arrested and returned to New York City to testify in a rape case.
In one of the most powerful episodes of the series, Benson works closely with a victim who has been assaulted around the country by the same attacker. The episode then leads Benson to travel to speak up about rape kit backlogs, a huge problem in our country today.
What at first seemed like a troubled rape investigation turns into a homicide case and the victim Benson was working with turns into the prime suspect. Benson must disclose the secrets of her past to connect with the woman and understand what took place.
After a long episode mostly consisting of dialogue between the two, Benson sits in the interrogation room for a breather in the episode's closing scene as the woman is being escorted out in handcuffs.
Benson goes undercover to take down a prison guard raping female inmates. She is taken by the guard to an empty room with nobody else and is almost rapped just as Fin comes to the rescue. This was Benson's first close call of being assaulted on the show.
When Noah's nanny comes to Benson when she thinks something weird is going on at another family's house, Benson intervenes to find herself stuck in a hostage situation that will keep you on the edge of your seat as Benson fights to stay alive and keep the family safe.
Benson must go through the whole ordeal again when William Lewis escapes from prison and makes Benson confess in a press conference that she lied at his trial. Benson then escapes her protected custody to save a girl being held by Lewis. The nerve-racking episode concludes with a wild game of Russian roulette between Benson and Lewis.
The Emmy-winning episode for Mariska Hargitay is one worth watching over and over again as Benson works around the clock nonstop to find a missing girl who is on the other line of a 911 call. Benson digs up the girl out of the ground herself after a confrontation with the kidnapper to find the girl unconscious but ends up saving her life.
In the biggest and most unforgettable episode of the series, Benson is kidnapped from her apartment by serial killer William Lewis who was under investigation by the SVU for rape and murder, and he holds her captive for days as she pleads for her life over and over again until she gains control of a metal rod from a bed and beats him up continuously with it out of anger. This life-changing event for Benson changed the future of the show and her ways with victims.
