In the 2014 episode of the 15th season of Internal Affairs, Captain Cragen retired from the Special Victims Unit. He asks Benson to take his place and leaves the department, blaming him. Captain Cragen leaves SVU in the One Eighty episode of Amaro. As seen in the series, Captain Cragen begins dating Eileen Switzer before his retirement. He explains that the reason for his departure is his girlfriend. Together, the two go on a trip around the world. But even after his retirement, Cragen reappears in the SVU episode Perverted Justice. He helps Benson and Rollins investigate a rape that took place during Cragen`s time as head of the 27th District. Throughout season 13, Cragen plays a more personal role in CSR affairs. In the episode “Russian Brides”, Cragen takes on an undercover mission to lure a murderer of mail order brides posing as the head of a children`s rights organization. During a conversation with his “date,” he mentions that he and his late wife talked about adopting a child after she suffered a miscarriage, but couldn`t find the time to do so. It`s still unclear whether Cragen is talking about his own life or simply improvising as part of his undercover role. [26] The season 13 finale, “Rhodium Nights,” ends with Cragen waking up in bed and finding the body of a young female escort next to him, her throat slit and her hands covered in blood.
He is suspended while the NYPD`s Internal Affairs Office investigates him for murder. In the season 14 premiere, Paula Foster, ADA bureau chief of the Public Integrity Unit, investigates Cragen in the escort`s murder.[27] He was arrested and detained at Rikers Island. SVU detectives are also working on the case and trying to prove that she was slandered. It is discovered that Cragen has hired some escorts for “Company”. After proving that the girl was murdered by her pimp Bart Ganzel (Peter Jacobson), Foster drops the murder charge, but announces that she is accusing him of several other crimes, prompting Benson and the SVU detectives to investigate Foster`s motives. [28] Benson discovers that Foster is on Wilson`s payroll. The SVU detectives arrest Foster, which allows the charges against Cragen to be dropped. Florek was eventually fired from the show after Don Ohlmeyer, president of NBC on the West Coast, ordered that more actresses be added to the series.[29] Wolf opposed the decision, but accepted it in the face of a possible annulment if he did not. He is one of the two fired actors of the series, along with Richard Brooks, who plays the role of assistant prosecutor Paul Robinette.
Wolf described Florek and Brooks` notification of decisions as “literally the two worst phone calls I`ve ever had to make in a business context.” Florek said he did not approve of the “quiet and hidden” way his dismissal had been handled. Then Florek was first cast as Donald Cragen in “Everybody`s Favorite Bagman,” the pilot episode of Law & Order.[38] The pilot was filmed and produced in 1988 and it would be another two years before NBC ordered the full series. While lead actors Noth, Dzundza, Michael Moriarty and Richard Brooks had each signed option deals that allowed them to be hired for the entire series, Florek had not signed such a contract. However, as he had no other acting roles at the time of the show`s production, he was available to join the cast of the series. Florek was living in Venice, Los Angeles at the time of his casting and had to be flown to New York for the filming of each episode.[35] At the beginning of the ninth season, Cragen is briefly released because several of his detectives, such as Detective Odafin Tutuola`s (Ice-T) stepson Darius Parker (Ludacris) commit three murders and are acquitted by them,[20] Benson helps his fugitive half-brother Simon Marsden (Michael Weston),[21] and his partner, Detective Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni). to conceal her daughter`s drunk driving. [22] Cragen is forced to move to the detective chief`s office and cede control of his compound to newly promoted Sergeant John Munch (Richard Belzer). However, the transmission is short-lived, as Cragen`s command is restored after Munch is entrusted to her sister`s care for a suspect (Cynthia Nixon) who feigns dissociative identity disorder, just to kill her parents. In season 11, he was again suspended for 10 days and told that any further problems with his unit would cost him his job.[23] [24] In “Ace,” he uses lethal force against a child trafficker who is about to kill a rape victim.
[25] His wife Marge was a flight attendant. In 1999, she died in a plane crash. (CSR: “One Life”). Over the next 15 years, he worked with Benson & Elliot Stabler (his two best detectives, for whom he became a mentor and father figure, especially Benson), John Munch, Odafin Tutuola, Brian Cassidy, Monique Jeffries, Dani Beck, Chester Lake, Amanda Rollins and Nick Amaro. After Florek left the show, Wolf kept in touch with the actor and often said he wanted to work with him again. Their ongoing correspondence led Florek to direct several episodes of Law & Order and Florek to reprise his role as Cragen in Exiled: A Law & Order Movie. When Wolf invited him to join the permanent cast of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, the TV series The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer, in which Florek played Abraham Lincoln, had just been canceled. Florek had originally planned to star in another comedy, but production was delayed, freeing up the actor`s schedule. Florek was reluctant to accept the role because, as he said, “I didn`t want to do the same thing; the inlaid but benevolent captain. He eventually agreed to join the cast, in part because Ohlmeyer no longer worked for NBC.
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