A young Arab woman is brutally raped and burned, and after identifying her, the detectives suspect her husband and mother-in-law. After a man accused of the murders of three Arabs, he claims that he was genetically and biologically predisposed to hatred and violence, but soon they uncover the real impetus to the slayings.

A young girl is in a coma after ingesting detergent and her mother is suspected of poisoning her. A biased judge makes the case hard to prosecute which leads to an investigation into his past.

The squad is at a loss on what to do with a violent homicide when Stabler's son points out that the event is straight out of a video game. Interviewing the game's creators leads them to a former employee, who then leads them (with a few other steps along the way) to a teenage couple who claim to be unable to distinguish fantasy from reality.

Doug Waverly and Nick Pratt are charged with rape and murder in the disappearance of Canadian student Jennifer Durning after Nick's cousin, Jason King, claims that while he had consensual sex with her that night the other two raped her. A stray pubic hair leads Novak to Keith Willis, a drunk who was paid off by the boys to get Jennifer out of the hotel and who later saw the boys kidnap her, but Willis exactly fit to be a witness as his mind has gone after years of alcohol abuse. Jason King disappears. Although they are able to find a bug in Donnelly's office, they are not able to prove that it was placed there by Pratt or Waverly. Judge Donnelly is forced to dismiss the case against the two boys since there is no case without Jason's testimony.

The team investigates the death of a partially clothed teenage boy wearing a leather mask. The detectives discover that the victim's best friend is the killer and has a video, showing that the boy's death was the result of a backyard wrestling match gone wrong.