Season 27 of SVU has been in no shortage of twists and turns as Benson and her elite squad secure justice alongside the steadfast A.D.A.s. SVU has long been hailed as a beacon for iconic guest stars, and Thomas upped the dramatic ante with his appearance as Nate Williams, a misunderstood father desperate to reunite with his teenage daughter. From emotional confrontations to shocking reveals, Benson was led on one doozy of an investigation after catching wind of Nate’s troubling case.

SVU Season 27’s “Hubris” featured many dynamite performances, but Sean Patrick Thomas stole the show with his passionate performance as a dad who refused to lose hope. Read on to learn all about Thomas’ SVU episode and his acting resume.

Sean Patrick Thomas’ acting credits include Save the Last Dance and more

While Thomas boasts a multi-decade career across genres, he has appeared in dozens of television and film projects aside from his Law & Order guest appearance. Some may recognize Thomas for his recent performance as Polarity in the action series Gen V, or for his role as Detective Temple Page in the early 2000s action series The District. Some of Thomas’ other recurring television credits include Reasonable Doubt, Ringer, and Reaper.

On the big screen, Thomas is applauded far and wide for his leading role as Derek in the hit 2001 film Save the Last Dance. Some of Thomas’ other iconic features include The Tragedy of Macbeth, The Fountain, Barber Shop, and Cruel Intentions, the latter in which he played Ronald Clifford. Aside from his tear-jerking performance on SVU, some of Thomas’ other recent television projects include Cruel Intentions and For All Mankind.

Sean Patrick Thomas played a misunderstood father on Law & Order: SVU

SVU Season 27, Episode 12 kicked off with Benson meeting a 15-year-old girl named Riley Williams at the hospital, soon learning the girl had been forced into prostitution by her abusive foster parents. Riley fled the hospital to go to her biological father’s home, leading Benson to meet Nate Williams, played by Thomas, who was sick with worry over his daughter’s condition.

After Riley begged to stay with her biological father to no avail, Benson discovered that Nate and his daughter had been separated after Riley was reported to CPS when she landed in the hospital with a broken arm. While Riley insisted she sustained the injury playing sports, a previous incident in which Nate waited a few too many days to bring Riley to the hospital as a baby led the family courts to believe there was a trend of child abuse and neglect.

But Riley’s life was far from improved in her new circumstances, and Nate desperately wanted to reunite with his daughter, so Benson decided to revisit the case. While touching base with her squad, they noted that during the initial report, the Bronx police found nothing criminal after speaking with Nate, Riley’s school, and the hospital, so the Bronx DA refused to prosecute.

However, the Bronx family courts brought forth Nate’s previous incident from when Riley was a baby, leading to the heartbreaking displacement. It didn’t take long for Detective Terry Bruno (Kevin Kane) to comment on the court’s potential profiling of Nate Williams for simply being a low-income Black single father.

Captain Renee Curry (Aimé Donna Kelly) agreed with Bruno’s hunch, adding, “In New York, more than half of the kids that are removed from their homes without a court order are Black, even though those kids only make up a quarter of the population.”

Benson mobilized the Bronx courts in hopes of getting the ruling overturned, crossing paths with pediatric abuse specialist Dr. Bethany Allen, the doctor responsible for separating Riley from her father, with a scathing testimony. After reiterating these claims in court, there was little the squad could do as the courts stalled and the Williams’ household remained broken.

Sean Patrick Thomas’ SVU episode ended with an emotional win

With one conversation with Dr. Bethany Allen, Benson smelled a God complex as she refused to second-guess her findings. Even after learning about Riley’s forced prostitution, Dr. Allen maintained her stance, inspiring Benson to go back and look at all of Allen’s grand-slam testimonies and visit a doctor friend from the same hospital, Dr. Ashley Mancini, to chat about the case.

Ashley ultimately ruled Riley’s case a tough call, but admitted doctors often get stuck on proving their own theories. After learning that Dr. Allen had bounced from job to job around the country and spent most of her time on the stand, Benson soon discovered another shady case from Dr. Allen’s lengthy history of testifying against single parents.

Dr. Allen had imprisoned a single mother for a year after ruling her baby had shown signs of abusive head trauma. However, the mother had been hurried into accepting a plea deal to avoid a jury trial, prompting Benson to give the medical records another look. Benson asked Dr. Mancini for another non-biased assessment, and was shocked by the findings.

Dr. Allen tampered with her report after running tests for a congenital blood disorder. Despite the baby testing positive for this disorder — a likely cause for the brain bleed — Dr. Allen deliberately withheld this test to support her original theory of child abuse.

With this irrefutable proof, the squad was able to drag Dr. Allen to court to question her corrupt deliberations. Cornered with her own questionable misdeeds, Dr. Allen was compelled to lie on the stand, giving the squad what they needed to stick her with perjury charges. In a cowardly attempt to avoid charges, Dr. Allen agreed to revoke her medical license, but not before revealing herself to be the corrupt racist that Benson suspected she’d always been.

After bringing Dr. Allen Bethany down, Benson was delighted to organize Riley’s secure return home to her dad, watching the emotional family reunion with delight.

Watch Law & Order: Special Victims Unit on Thursdays at 9/8c on NBC and the next day on Peacock.