April Troost (Estella Warren) is the main villainess of "Design", episode 7.02 of Law & Order: SVU (and later, episode 16.02 of the original Law & Order, "Flaw").
History[]
April Troost was the only daughter of Lorraine Dillon, whom she raised to be a cold and calculating sociopath so she could be her partner in her various scams. April even began running schemes with Patrick Sullivan, one of her mother's many boyfriends. But one day, when April was 14, Patrick raped and impregnated April, and one of April's stepfathers later had her sent to a facility to have the baby privately to protect it from Lorraine. But after having a boy and finding that he was deformed, the evil April enlisted the help of Arliss Driver (the facility's cook who had driven April to the hospital to give birth) to dispose of her baby, wrapping it an a garbage bag and burying her son alive.
After that, April and Arliss began a month-long relationship before April stole his money and car and left, presumably going home to her criminal partner mother. Ten years later, April met her biological father, Douglas McManus, and got a job working for him as an accountant.
Law & Order: SVU[]
Prior to the events of "Design", April had seduced thirty-four wealthy men in New York, drugging them and using electroejaculation to retrieve their semen in attempts to impregnate herself while also giving some samples to her father. Eventually, she succeeded in doing so with successful scientist Barclay Pallister and, eight months after becoming pregnant, April stood on the ledge of a hotel building to appear suicidal before tearfully claiming to the responding officers that she had been raped. Detective Olivia Benson came and "talked" April off the ledge, who later named Barclay as her rapist. During the trial, after April intentionally hurt her case by going to Barclay's lawyer wanting to settle, April staged her own death by smearing her blood on the walls of her apartment and setting her car on fire, making it appear that Barclay killed her at her apartment and staged her death as a car accident. It was later revealed that she had scammed several couples into believing she would let them adopt her baby once it was born.
After bringing in Douglas McManus for questioning, he revealed his innocence in April's "murder" by providing them with the hotel room she was staying at, where Benson arrested April. April and her lawyer tried to claim that Lorraine was the cause of April's crimes for having raised April to be a sociopath, a point that Dr. George Huang proved as false. During her session with the doctor, the evil vixen refused to tell them where her baby was until she got a plea deal. Eventually, after much hesitation, Novak gave her a deal that guaranteed she wouldn't go to prison and April revealed that the baby was with Lorraine, who had been colluding with her daughter in her villainous schemes and was about to leave for Florida with her grandchild. Benson and Stabler were able to stop her at the train station and retrieve the baby from her.
Law & Order[]
April resurfaced in "Flaw" along with Lorraine, with the two pulling another scheme to extort $500,000 from businessman David Glass along with Patrick Sullivan (who they had regrouped with). The deal commenced between David and Patrick, with April posing as one of his marks. Lorraine then burst in posing as an SEC agent, pretending to shoot Patrick dead when the two got into an altercation, using squibs to further the deception. But later on, the greedy April killed Patrick for real to get his share of their ill-gotten money, claiming to her mother that she'd been motivated by his previous rape of her. When Benson discovered the gun April had used to kill Patrick, Lorraine took the blame for the murder, saying that Patrick had attacked her when she confronted him about the molestation.
But during the trial, when April took the stand, the manipulative April recanted her accusations against Patrick and claimed that they were lovers and that Lorraine had killed Patrick out of jealousy and made April say he had abused her to cover for her. Not wanting to let April get away, though, the detectives continued investigating and uncovered her murder of her baby when she was 14. But they were unable to find enough evidence to arrest her for the cruel crime and Benson's attempt to bluff April into a confession did nothing to faze the heartless manipulator. But at that moment, Benson brought Lorraine into the interrogation room, having confessed to April killing her son in exchange for a plea deal. April was outraged at her mother, but once she realized she was backed into a corner, agreed to confess to all her crimes in exchange for a deal of her own (but not one shorter than her moher's).
Quotes[]
- "Mother always told me, if you're too stupid to see the wool being pulled over your eyes, you deserve what you get." (April during her session with Dr. Huang)
- "I'm too beautiful for prison." (April's justification for why she wouldn't go to jail)
- "Well played, Mother." (April "congratulating" her mother for ratting her out)
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