A child abandonment incident prompts Benson and Stabler investigate the disappearance of a mother. They learn from her sister that she made a deal with human traffickers to have her teenage daughter smuggled to New York from China. It is revealed that the teenage immigrant has been forced into prostitution and that her life is being used as a bargaining chip by the gangsters to avoid prosecution. When the squad captures the gang's leader, Detective Stabler is able to get help from one of his junior members by convincing him that the bright future he was promised is a lie. After arresting a corrupt immigration attorney, the NYPD finally learns where the captive women are being held. Detective Stabler arrives just in time to keep the promise he made.
A young woman appears to be raped and left for dead, but she was trying to kill herself, and when she succeeds, the woman who helped her is put on trial.
A spy cam in a bathroom uncovers the molestation of a 12-year-old boy by his high school principal, but the explanation for her behavior is quite shocking.