Dominick Carisi, Jr.

Dominick "Sonny" Carisi, Jr. is a fictional character on the NBC police procedural drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, portrayed by Peter Scanavino. Carisi is a detective with the Manhattan SVU at the 16th Precinct of the New York Police Department.

Background

Carisi is an inexperienced detective who transfers to the Manhattan Special Victims Unit as Detective Nick Amaro's (Danny Pino) temporary replacement when Amaro is reassigned to Queens. He began his law enforcement career as a patrol officer on Staten Island; after making detective, he spent two months with the Staten Island Special Victims Unit, Brooklyn SVU for almost a month and Queens SVU for a week before transferring to Manhattan.^[1]

Character within SVU

Carisi gets off to a rough start with his new colleagues in the sixteenth season premiere episode "Girls Disappeared" coming off as blunt and insensitive during his initial meeting with Sergeant Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) and Detective Amanda Rollins (Kelli Giddish).^[1] He's shown a knack for interrogations, by pretending to empathize with suspects and getting them to open up to him.

Unlike his older, more seasoned colleagues, he has difficulty keeping his emotions in check when confronted by the horrific crimes he sees every day. He is particularly upset by a case in which a prominent dentist rapes his own niece; as the dentist is being booked for arraignment, Carisi loses his temper and nearly breaks the man's hand.^[2]

In the fifth episode, it is revealed that Carisi has permanently joined the Manhattan SVU team. In the same episode, Carisi helps turn one suspect against another during the investigation of a porn star's rape, earning him praise from Benson.^[3] Throughout the 16th season, he mentions that he is going to night classes at Fordham University's law school. A running joke has Carisi annoying ADA Rafael Barba with unsolicited advice on how to prosecute cases.

In "Parole Violations", his sister Bella's fiancé Tommy reports that his female parole officer raped him at gunpoint in her office. While he dislikes Tommy, Carisi comes to believe his story and works hard to make sure that the woman is brought to justice.

Appearances and crossovers

• Chicago PD — episode: "The Number Of Rats" (2015)

Development

In May 2014 following the conclusion of the fifteenth season finale episode, SVU Executive Producer Warren Leight revealed that a new detective would temporarily replace Amaro for the first 3 episodes of the sixteenth season.^[5]

Peter Scanavino was approached to portray Detective Dominick Carisi, "a guy who has a little less polish...who maybe needs a little bit of refining". Initially, Scanavino was not a permanent addition to the cast, but rather a guest star. However, he was promoted to the main cast in the fifth episode of the same season, "Pornstar's Requiem".^[5][6]

Carisi isn't the only character Scanavino has portrayed on SVU – or in the Law & Order franchise. In 2013, Scanavino guest starred SVU's fourteenth season episode, "Monster's Legacy", as an attempted murderer, Johnny Dubcek. Prior to this, he had appeared in Law & Order: Trial by Jury, Law & Order: Criminal Intent and Law & Order in various roles.

References