Elizabeth Olivet

Olivet is introduced as a clinical psychologist who performs consultation work for the 27th Detective Squad and District Attorney's office in Manhattan. She is usually tasked with interviewing murder suspects to assess whether or not they are legally sane, and to assist the DA's office in forming psychological profiles.

In her first appearance, she is hired by the precinct as a grief counselor for Det. Mike Logan (Chris Noth) when his partner Max Greevey (George Dzundza) is murdered in the line of duty. After a rocky start, she helps Logan cope with the loss, and the two form a close bond.[1] The character appears in several episodes afterward.

Olivet does not offer easy answers with more complicated cases. This tendency results some frustration to Executive ADA Ben Stone (Michael Moriarty) and particularly to his successor, Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), whose prosecution strategies are sometimes hampered by her diagnoses. She is also generally in favor of compassionate, involved psychotherapy in mental institutions, rather than imprisonment or antipsychotic drugs, for genuinely disturbed criminals; this is often shown to clash with the detectives' sense of justice.

In the 1992 episode "Helpless", Olivet is molested and raped by a gynecologist, Dr. Alex Merritt (Paul Hecht). While Merritt is eventually incarcerated, Olivet's emotional scars never fully heal. A little while later in the episode "Point of View" Olivet returns but her rape comes back to haunt her and threaten her good judgement. Where she's been subpoenaed by the suspect's lawyer to testify in court (the suspect being a woman whom Olivet interviewed about the killing of a man who may have raped the suspect), the district attorney brings up Olivet's rape to help their case. Later Executive DA Ben Stone apologizes to her and she forgives him.[2] Several years later, as she is talking to Logan in the 2006 Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode "To the Bone", she is implied to have started a family.[3]

The character was effectively written out of the show in 1997; in the Law & Order universe, Olivet goes into private practice. She is replaced by Dr. Emil Skoda. In the 2002 season, she returns to do freelance work with the DA's office. She would later appear in several episodes of Law & Order.

McCoy's volatile relationship with Olivet begins with his first encounter with her in the 1994 episode "Blue Bamboo". In that episode, Olivet interviews a defendant (Laura Linney) who had murdered a sexually abusive employer and informs McCoy professionally that she believes the woman was traumatized by the abuse she suffered. McCoy retorts belligerently that she does not belong on his witness list.[4] Since then, McCoy has had a tenuous relationship with Olivet. At times, he has retreated from his defensive position to convince her to help; examples include the episode "Privileged", in which McCoy needs her expert testimony to convict an alcoholic (Eddie Malavarca) accused of murdering his foster parents.[5]

In the 2008 episode "Betrayal", McCoy reveals that, in her days as a grief counselor, Olivet had sex with a police detective whose partner had been murdered; while not directly stated, it is implied that the detective was Logan. Olivet feels compelled to contradict the prosecution's expert witness, Dr. Lydia Stronach (Nancy Hess), who had done studies on child sexual abuse that were officially censured as dangerous and damaging by the authoritative body in her field. When Olivet informs McCoy that she will be testifying for the defense, he feels he has no other choice but to provide Michael Cutter (Linus Roache), his successor as Executive ADA, with information that could be used in their favor when cross-examining Olivet. When Cutter questions Olivet during the trial, she confirms the affair, but adds that she stopped treating the (still unnamed) detective shortly after the relationship began.[6]

• In the 1996 New York Undercover episode "Smack Is Back", she counsels Detective Nina Moreno (Lauren Vélez).
• In the 2000 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Baby Killer", she is hired by a defense attorney to help defend a young boy accused of murder and finds herself at odds with a former colleague, Alexandra Cabot (Stephanie March).[7] She also makes brief appearances in the SVU episodes "...Or Just Look Like One", "Abuse", "Deadly Ambition", "Pathological" and "Remember Me Too".
• In the Law & Order: Trial by Jury episode "Day", Olivet consults with Tracey Kibre (Bebe Neuwirth) on the mental stability of a rape suspect whom Kibre is prosecuting.[8]
• In the 2006 Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode "To the Bone", Logan goes to her for counselling after he accidentally kills an undercover police officer.[3]
• Also on Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Olivet treats Detective Alexandra Eames (Kathryn Erbe) after she is abducted and tortured,[9] and her partner Detective Robert Goren (Vincent D’Onofrio) while he is on suspension.[10]

• Carolyn McCormick at IMDb