A Timeline of Trauma: Olivia Benson From 'SVU' Has Survived Her Share of Sexual Assault

One big query that has been coming back since Day 1 on ‘Law & Order: SVU’ is “used to be Olivia Benson raped?” Keep studying to determine.

We do not assume it is too a ways of a stretch to call CAPTAIN(!!) Olivia Benson the TV mother of the #MeToo motion. Law & Order: Special Victims Unit's Junior Detective grew to become Senior Detective became NYPD Sergeant, and, until the Season 21 premiere, Lieutenant, has been solving crimes and serving to abuse sufferers for the previous twenty years.

And whilst we now have watched her take down hundreds of rapists, many fanatics surprise how Olivia's non-public lifestyles led her to become the unit's most useful member. 

In undeniable phrases, Was Olivia Benson ever raped? Here's a timeline of her traumas.

Olivia Benson was a product of rape.

For a bit of Benson backstory, it sort of feels crucial to remind viewers that Olivia had a rough formative years and was once raised via an alcoholic mother who was raped via her father, Joseph Hollister. It used to be this undeniable fact that moved her to pursue a career the place she could give a voice to the sufferers of sex crime.

We know from the early days of SVU, that Olivia's mother, Serena Benson used to be an English professor at Hudson University. But when she used to be nonetheless a student at Columbia working in the cafeteria, she was once raped through Joe, a food salesman.

While Serena was once a deeply bothered alcoholic who physically and emotionally abused Olivia, Benson was once in the long run very sad when her mother died from injuries sustained during a 2000 inebriated fall. Ultimately, she realized that she had a half-brother from her biological father's facet, Simon Marsden, who used to be falsely accused of rape and cleared of any wrongdoing in Season 8.

So, was Olivia Benson raped?

While Olivia is deeply sympathetic with victims of intercourse crimes given her private history, she additionally came terrifyingly just about being sexually assaulted herself on two separate events.

In one of the most productive SVU episodes of historical past, Season 9's "Undercover," Olivia is going undercover in a women's prison to bring down Captain Lowell Harris, a guard who has been accused of raping several inmates. 

While there, the guard attacks Olivia and attempts to pressure her to accomplish oral sex on him, despite the fact that her SVU colleague Fin Tutuola, who used to be additionally undercover as a fellow guard, will get there just in time to stop the rape. 

When clinical examiner Melinda Warner asks Olivia if she was once raped, she solutions, "It was the closest I've ever come."

Over the course of Seasons 10 and 11, we watch Benson combat with being a sufferer of sexual assault herself and come to terms with her PTSD. But issues get much worse for Olivia on the finish of Season 14, when she is kidnapped by means of serial rapist and murderer William Lewis.

Over the path of a couple of episodes, we watch as William drugs Olivia and takes her with him to witness the rapes and tortures of several women. It's a completely insane sequence of episodes that we propose gazing (with the lighting on!) if you haven't observed them already.

While he beats, tortures, and burns Olivia whilst retaining her hostage over the path of 4 days, Olivia manages to break away and handcuff William simply at the moment the place he's about to rape her, then beats him virtually to loss of life with an iron mattress rod.

Though she returns to work after a Cragen-mandated depart, Olivia is deeply traumatized via William Lewis, something she nonetheless carries with her as of late. 

During William's trial, she lies underneath oath announcing that she simplest beat him as a result of he lunged at her, and whilst he's in the long run convicted of kidnapping and assaulting a police officer, the participants of the jury specific doubts about Benson's tale and acquit him of tried rape.

William induces his own cardiac arrest to escape from prison, then dives again into his rape spree. He will get Benson to carry a press conference to confess she lied on the witness stand as a situation of releasing the younger girl he's protecting hostage. Although she upholds her finish of the cut price, he does not.

With his young hostage gazing, William finally makes an attempt to rape Olivia however changes his thoughts because she's now not scared enough for it to show him on. Instead, the 2 play Russian roulette and William finally ends up killing himself right earlier than her eyes.

Since William Lewis, Olivia has never been the same and admits to her unit that the trauma he brought about will all the time be a section of her.

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. on NBC.

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