Law & Order (TV Series)

Blood Money (1999)

Sam Waterston: Executive ADA Jack McCoy

Quotes 

• Jack McCoy : [about the book]  Turns out it was the only bargaining chip they had. Insurance for insurance men.

  Abbie Carmichael : It's still scary to think that without that book, they could've claimed that *none* of it was real.

  D.A. Adam Schiff : It wasn't the *book* that made it real.

• Alan Bresler : Can I talk to you?

  Jack McCoy : I can't do that without your attorney present, Mr. Bresler.

  Alan Bresler : I *am* an attorney, Mr. McCoy, I know what I'm doing. I just watched a man's son destroy his own life. I have a son myself.

• Jack McCoy : How did you know Mr. Grimaldi?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : My father made us memorize Pietro Grimaldi's name and told us where to go incase anything ever happened.

  Jack McCoy : What happened after your father bought the life insurance from Mr. Grimaldi?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : Hitler happened! And when it was over, all I could find was my sister, she was very sick.

  Jack McCoy : What did you do?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : We walked, over a year. To get to Italy. I had to carry her most of the time. When we finally arrived, I found Pietro Grimaldi and told him we needed our father's money, or my sister would die. He said he had no recollection of my father, and no policy number, and without a death certificate, I couldn't even prove that my father was dead. The Nazis didn't give death certificates, but I have one from Italy, for my sister.

• Mr. Radsenhauer : It was 1939, the last time we were all together as a family. The Germans just moved into Poland and things became very difficult.

  Jack McCoy : Difficult?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : For the Jews. My father owned a small trucking company. He came to work one day to find all his trucks burned, and the windows of our garage broken. Unfortunately most of the Poles didn't need much encouragement to hate us. That night, Mr. Grimaldi showed up.

  Jack McCoy : And he talked to your father?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : He told my father Jews are being killed in Germany, it's just a matter of time for all of us. Then he showed my father a picture of women and children in a ditch, shot. Then he offered to sell my father insurance, of course he bought.

• Arthur Gold : Prior to this trial, sir, had you ever heard of the All-Atlantic Insurance Company?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : No.

  Arthur Gold : Then your father didn't buy a policy from them, did he?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : He bought from Federali.

  Arthur Gold : So you would have not made a claim against the All-Atlantic Insurance Company, because you had no reason to believe that they owed you any money, is that right?

  Jack McCoy : Objection, the question calls for a legal conclusion.

  Arthur Gold : Judge, it is the People's theory that my clients stole a book to prevent this man and others like him from claiming their insurance. I'd like a chance to find out whether he thinks my clients owed him any money in the first place.

  Judge : Do you think these men owe you anything, Mr. Radsenhauer?

  Mr. Radsenhauer : I think, these men should close their eyes, and see my sister. See her as the little girl she once was... and as the woman she *should* have been. Then I want them to open their eyes, and tell me if they think they owe me anything.

• Jack McCoy : Just before his death, your father was subpoenaed by the Italian government to give testimony about certain insurance policies he sold during the war. Testimony that might have cost All-Atlantic hundreds of millions of dollars.

  Abbie Carmichael : Did your father ever tell you about his work?

  Donna Grimaldi : Just that he was an insurance salesman.

  Jack McCoy : But did he ever tell you who he sold insurance to or how he came to work for All-Atlantic?

  Donna Grimaldi : What are you saying? Who did my father sell insurance to?

  Abbie Carmichael : [pause]  Holocaust victims.

• Hamilton Stewart : You make it sound like we were the only ones, we weren't. American car companies, banks, airplane manufacturers, we were all doing business with Germany. My God, our own State Department refused entry to these people based on the same information we had.

  Jack McCoy : It was just business.

  Hamilton Stewart : Yes.

  Jack McCoy : Good business. So good you rewarded Peter Grimaldi with a job at the parent company the minute he stepped off the boat, didn't you?

  Hamilton Stewart : Peter produced for us in Europe.

  Jack McCoy : Pretty risky proposition for an insurance company to sell life insurance during wartime, isn't it Mr. Stewart?

  Hamilton Stewart : I suppose.

  Jack McCoy : Because war raises the risk of death, isn't that right?

  Hamilton Stewart : Yes.

  Jack McCoy : And death is certainly not good business for a life insurance company, is it?

  Hamilton Stewart : No.

  Jack McCoy : But All-Atlantic couldn't sell policies fast enough, could it? Because you knew the people you were selling to had no hope of ever collecting. No hope of ever presenting a death certificate.

  Arthur Gold : Objection.

  Jack McCoy : Maybe they should've brought you their parents' ashes in a bag to you.

  Judge : [slams gavel]  Mr. McCoy.

• Jack McCoy : Millions of dollars being paid in the sale of life insurance, and yet in over 50 years, not a single policy *ever* paid. What do you suppose happened to all those people, Mr. Stewart?

  Hamilton Stewart : I have no idea.

  Jack McCoy : Don't tell us you didn't know. The fact of the matter is you *counted* on it.