Law & Order: SVU season 26 episode 18 recap — is the victim the suspect?

In Law & Order: SVU season 26 episode 18, "The Accuser," Eddie Upshaw (Todd A. Horman) is alone in his welding shop working late when a shadowy figure knocks him unconscious from behind. Later in the night, 17-year-old Sam Carson (Caleb Malis) and his father, Nate (Erik Palladino), show up to collect Sam’s last paycheck. However, what they find instead is a gruesome scene.

As Olivia (Mariska Hargitay) and her team investigate the case and try to figure out who attacked Eddie, they soon learn Eddie has a troubling past that begs the question: Is Eddie the victim, the suspect or both?

Here’s what happened in Law & Order: SVU season 26 episode 18.

What happened to Eddie?

When Nate and Sam arrive at the shop, they find Eddie slumped over naked and bleeding, with the date, "June 15, 2001," carved into his back.

Fin (Ice-T), Bruno (Kevin Kane), Curry (Aimé Donna Kelly) and Velasco (Octavio Pisano) arrive at the scene, and they’re quickly briefed. Sam tells Bruno and Fin he used to work for Eddie until he got fired for messing something up on the job. Sam was with his girlfriend earlier in the night when his father called, furious Sam didn’t try to get his job back, so Sam met with his father and the two came to the welding shop.

The next morning, the team debriefs Olivia. She wants the team to speak with angry exes or disgruntled employees. Velasco and Rene question Jack, the last employee to see Eddie before the attack. Jack says Eddie is a good guy, but doesn’t talk much about his personal life. They ask him about Sam, to which Jack responds he’s a good kid who doesn’t always use common sense; he was fired for a mistake.

Fin and Bruno talk to Sam’s girlfriend, who confirms being with him the previous day. However, she notes she met with Sam after school for a little bit, but she was home by 4 pm, meaning Sam’s version of the timeline doesn’t match up.

Back in the squad room, Bruno confirms Sam’s father was working late, so he couldn’t have attacked Eddie, who was found by 9 pm. TARU went through Eddie’s phone, and found nothing suspicious other than Eddie called Sam 10 times the night of the crime, but Sam never returned the call.

Sam and his father are brought into the station. When Bruno mentions all the calls, Sam claims he must have had his phone on silent. Sam says nothing happened, but Fin and Bruno reveal they talked to his girlfriend. Pressed to tell the truth by the detectives and his father, Sam confesses after he left his girlfriend’s, he went to the park. However, he has no idea why Eddie called him 10 times. Furthermore, neither Sam nor his dad has a clue why the particular date was carved in Eddie’s back.

Now awake in the hospital, Bruno and Fin meet with Eddie, who was unfortunately sodomized. He doesn’t recall much of what happened as he was hit from behind. They show him a picture of the date on his back, but Eddie says the date doesn’t mean anything. He gets upset and says he didn’t do anything to anyone to deserve this.

Why would someone want to attack Eddie?

Velasco and Rene pay Jenny (Kate Middleton), Eddie’s ex-wife, a visit. She says Eddie didn’t put up much of a fight when she filed for divorce, and their kids don’t have much of a relationship with him. They ask if she can think of anyone with a vendetta against Eddie? She can’t.

Bruno gets a text from Sam wanting to meet in the park. Sam tells Bruno he’s afraid this is all his fault. He’s been working for Eddie since he was 15. Eddie used to give him rides home and started asking him questions about what Sam would do with girls and what Sam would do with himself when he was alone. Eddie told Sam to pull his pants down, and he just froze. Sam kept going back to the shop afterwards and was afraid to tell his dad the truth. Bruno later goes to Olivia’s home and says Sam didn’t commit the crime, but had reason to want to.

The next day, the squad catches Carisi (Peter Scanavino) up with the latest and shares they are looking into Eddie’s past, finding Sam is hardly Eddie’s first victim. Olivia asks Carisi if they can make a case against Eddie while also investigating his assault. Carisi confirms they can, but Bruno chimes in that Sam doesn’t want to testify.

Later, Olivia and Bruno sit with Sam and his parents as Sam tells them what happened with Eddie. His parents are sympathetic to their son and question if Eddie's messing around with minors is what led to his attack. Olivia confirms that’s their working theory. When the conversation moves to the possibility of Sam testifying against Eddie in court, Sam is not sure he can do that. However, his father wants Sam to do it so Eddie can go to prison. Sam just wants to go home.

Doing some digging, Curry locates an old arrest record for Eddie from 2002. They can’t find the name of the victim though, as she was a minor and the case was sealed. Velasco and Curry go to a police warehouse in Queens to go through paperwork to find more information. They eventually discover that Eddie’s case went to trial in 2004 and he was acquitted. The victim was redacted from the file, but she was 11 at trial and 8 when the abuse began in 2001. Curry and Velasco go back to talk to Eddie’s ex-wife to see why she lied about Eddie and the date not meaning anything, considering she was married to Eddie at the time of his trial.

Meet Angela Jones

Eddie's ex-wife says the girl in the case was lying and looking for attention. The ex eventually gives up the name, Angela Jones. Angela was in prison for the past five years, but was recently paroled three days before Eddie was attacked.

Fin and Bruno go to the hospital and show Eddie a lineup of suspects on a tablet to see if he can identify his attacker. He’s doubtful that his attacker was a woman. They press him about Angela Jones and Sam, but he says both of them are lying and claims he’s now done talking to detectives.

Now knowing the date carved in Eddie’s back was the first time he abused Angela, Velasco and Curry go to her apartment to speak with her. Angela hears them coming and flees, but Curry eventually catches her.

In an interrogation room, Olivia and Carisi talk to Angela about the abuse case and Eddie. Angela says no one believed her as a child besides Eddie’s daughter. They then discuss the attack on Eddie. She owns the fact that she did it, noting that going to prison is worth it. Olivia hates what Angela did to Eddie, but is sympathetic to her being a victim and no one believing her.

By the end of the episode, Sam tells Bruno he has an appointment with a therapist and wants to face things. The teen questions if he’ll end up like Angela, wanting to hurt people after having been hurt. Bruno replies the therapist will make sure that doesn’t happen. Elsewhere, Carisi and Olivia tell Angela the DA has agreed to offer her a plea deal considering what she’s been through with Eddie. If Angela pleads to felony assault, she’ll be placed on parole and put into a psyche program.

New episodes of Law and Order: SVU air on Thursdays on NBC and become available the next day on Peacock.