The evil Grace Pardue
Grace Pardue (Peri Gilpin) is the main villainess from "Offense," episode 7.08 of Law & Order: Criminal Intent (airdate November 29, 2007). She is the wife of retired football player Curtis Pardue and mother of college football player Tim Pardue.
Tim Pardue was one of three football players who were accused of raping Carla Sanchez, who worked as a stripper at one of their parties, with Carla's friend and fellow stripper Traci Kwon serving as the key witness to the high profile case. Regarding Grace, she had been proclaiming her son's innocence throughout the ordeal, but at some point, Beth Hoyle (who was prosecuting the players with her hsuband, ADA Gene Hoyle) informed Grace that Traci going to testify on the following morning, adding that Tim would end up in prison while the other two players--who had high priced lawyers that the Pardue family couldn't afford--would get off.
On the aforementioned following morning, Grace went to Traci's apartment attempting to talk to her, only to Traci to refuse to let her in, leading to Grace waiting for Traci in the hall of the apartment building. After seeing Traci on top of the stairs, Grace turned heel and shoved Traci down the stairs, killing her. After killing Traci, the evil Grace took her purse to set up the murder as a robbery, but the investigation's progression revealed that Carla and Traci both lied about the players raping the former to cover up the fact that Carla was seeing her ex-boyfriend
Detectives Mike Logan and Nola Falacci were led to believe that Traci's plan to tell the truth was motive for murder, with both Hoyles being suspected. The episode's climax saw Logan and Falacci set up a trap to catch the true killer, which included the reveal that Beth informed Grace about Traci's plan to testify to get Tim to confess. Logan was set on arresting Tim for the murder, only for Grace to confess to killing Traci, doing so to save her son, She broke down when she was informed that Tim truly was innocent and that Traci was going to tell the truth, and she was later arrested for Traci's murder.