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| “ | Be a man! This voice in my head kept saying, "Do it, be a man, be a man!" BE A MAN! I DIDN'T FLINCH, ARE YOU HAPPY NOW?! | „ |
| ~ Sam telling his father John that his abuse drove him to kill his classmates. |
Sam Conway is the secondary antagonist of the two-part Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Man Up/Man Down". He is a teenager who commits a school shooting after his abusive father, John, rapes him as punishment for showing weakness.
He was portrayed by Bryce Romero.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Sam is the youngest son of John and Molly Conway, and the younger brother to Brian Conway. He is close to his mother and brother, but has a dysfunctional relationship with his father, a bully who mercilessly berates and mocks him for any show of weakness. If Sam does anything that falls short of John's warped, toxic ideal of manliness, including crying, showing fear, or empathing with others, John insults his masculinity and makes him wear Molly's dresses while calling him girl's names. Neither Molly, who is terrified of her husband, nor Brian, who believes his behavior is normal, does anything to help or protect Sam, whose whole life becomes a failed effort to please his father.
"Man Up"[]
John takes Sam and Brian on a weekend hunting trip, during which he shoots and mortally wounds a rabbit. He tells Sam to slit the rabbit's throat, but Sam cannot bring himself to do it. John berates him for letting the animal suffer before snapping its neck. Sam tries to apologize, but John tells him he will have to "learn". That night, John rapes Sam in order to shame him for his supposed failure. Molly walks in on the rape, but Sam yells at her to leave, while John intimidates her into remaining silent and washing Sam's bloodstained underwear to get rid of evidence.
The next day, Sam goes to the school nurse with rectal bleeding, causing the nurse to call the NYPD's Special Victims Unit. SVU Detective Dominick Carisi Jr. tries to get Sam to tell him who is hurting him, but Sam insists that he merely fell. The next day, Brian attacks Sam at school for talking to the police, and Carisi arrests him, believing at first that Brian raped his brother. John goes to the SVU precinct to take Brian and Sam home, and tells Lieutenant Olivia Benson that Sam is gay and suffered his injuries after having sex with another boy during the hunting trip, a story Sam goes along with. That night, Sam sneaks out of the house and gets drunk at a gay bar, telling a man who tries to pick him up that he has "become a man".
Convinced that Sam is being abused, Benson and Carisi go to the Conway house and confront Molly, who admits to witnessing John rape their son. John comes home moments later, and Benson and Carisi arrest him. Assistant District Attorney Peter Stone charges John with rape and child sexual abuse, but Sam insists under oath that his father did not hurt him, while John's lawyer tricks Molly into saying that she is not sure what she saw in Sam's room. John is acquitted, and Sam is put back in his custody.
"Man Down"[]
Sam snaps after an exchange with his father in which John says, "I don't know why I bother," and goes to school armed with John's rifle and opens fire, killing two students and wounding several others. The SVU detectives respond to the shooting, and Carisi finds a remorseful Sam in the school gym, working up the nerve to turn the gun on himself. Carisi manages to talk him down by saying that his father is worried about him, and Sam surrenders. When John shows up at the SVU precinct, however, he hits Sam in the face, and eventually bullies him into pleading guilty to murder. Sam is tried as an adult and sentenced to 60 years to life in prison.
Stone visits Sam in prison and apologizes for failing to save him from John's abuse. Sam replies, "Don't you know only pussies apologize?" before going back to his cell. Stone intuits that Sam heard that from his father, and becomes convinced that John's abuse is responsible for Sam's violence. He charges John with criminally negligent homicide, and calls Sam to testify against his father. Under Stone's cross-examination, Sam tells the jury about John's abuse; when Stone asks him what was going through his mind as he committed the shooting, Sam replies that he heard John's voice telling him to "be a man". Sam then yells at his father that he finally "acted like a man", just like he had always wanted. The jury finds John guilty of second-degree murder, while Sam returns to prison.
External Links[]
- Sam Conway on the Law & Order Wiki
