Odafin "Fin" Tutuola

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Law & Order character
Detective Odafin Tutuola
Time on show	2000-present
Preceded by	Monique Jeffries
Succeeded by	Current
First appearance	Wrong Is Right
Last appearance	N/A
Portrayed by	Ice-T

Detective Odafin Tutuola is a fictional character on the TV drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. He is played by Ice-T.

[edit] On SVU

A former Narcotics detective, Tutuola replaced Monique Jeffries after she left the SVU squad in 2000. He was then paired with Detective John Munch.

While in the Narcotics division, Tutuola worked undercover regularly. He would often spend weeks or even months at a time in various alternate identities. He left Narcotics and transferred to SVU when his partner took a bullet that was meant for him.

Tutuola initially had a rocky relationship with his colleagues in SVU, especially with Olivia Benson and John Munch, although that has changed in recent seasons. Unlike them, he saw the world in black and white, with all criminals equally deserving of prison regardless of any extenuating circumstances. He also kept a tight rein on his emotions, refusing to talk about his problems or to admit that the grisly nature of his work often affected him. For example, he and Munch had been partners for nearly a year before he opened up about his former partner's death. He never mentioned his son to Munch, only a passing reference to a lab technician in season 3. It wasn't until season 6 that his son made an appearance on the show, and their rocky relationship was revealed.

[edit] Character evolution

Over the six years he has spent with the 16th Precinct so far, Tutuola has come to respect and trust his SVU colleagues, even though they often disagree over the best way to solve cases. An example is his partnership with Munch, which has grown from icy distrust to mutual respect and good-natured banter, often about politics, as Munch is politically left-wing and Tutuola is a registered Republican. After Munch was shot in the buttocks by a white supremacist during a court trial in the 7th season episode "Raw", Tutuola surprised Munch in the hospital with a milkshake.

Tutuola has been known to reach out to victims and suspects, especially those in the African-American community. When some suspects or victims won't talk to other detectives, they will talk to him. He can relate to those who live in poor, violent areas, as he grew up in one himself.

As a detective, he is meticulous and pays close attention to detail, often uncovering a previously overlooked piece of evidence that will solve a case. He once was awarded the Combat Cross, a medal given to detectives who have found themselves in shootouts on the job.

In 2004, Tutuola was gravely wounded while attempting to stop a holdup at a bodega; after being released from the hospital, he spent little time recovering, instead throwing himself back into work finding a kidnapped victim and busting a meth lab. In this episode we are introduced to his old boss from the Narcotics division: Lt. Pizzelli (Albert Insinnia).

Recently, while attempting to solve the murders of AIDS victims, Tutuola once again sought help from his son. Ken, a computer science major, helped the SVU squad locate the hacker who fraudulently obtained a list of AIDS patients. In the course of the investigation, Tutuola learned that Ken himself was gay. Their relationship was tested again in the episode "Venom", when uniform cops found Ken digging up a city street and took him in. Ken contacted Olivia Benson instead of his father and told her he was digging up the street to look for a body of a dead woman. The investigation, which first focused on Ken, took a new turn when DNA evidence showed that Ken's cousin Darius Park was not only the murderer but was also Ken's older half-brother, who had been abandoned by his mother. The episode ended with Darius threatening to expose the entire family's secrets in court.

[edit] Trivia

• Tutuola means "The Gentle One" in the Yoruba language of southwestern Nigeria^{[citation needed]}.
• When Ice-T asked series producer Dick Wolf how the part was supposed to be performed, Wolf told him to simply just do what Ice-T would do if he were a cop^{[citation needed]}.