Why You Recognize Law & Order Guest Star Abigail Spencer, Who Played a Defendant and Abused Wife
If Abigail Spencer, who played one of the defendants on the February 13, 2025 episode of Law & Order, looked familiar, there's good reason for that.
Abigail Spencer was back in the courtroom, but this time, the Suits alum wasn't fighting for the rights of others as a savvy attorney on the beloved legal drama. Instead, she had to fight for her own freedom in a powerful new guest-star role on Law & Order.
In Season 24, Episode 12, titled “Duty to Protect,” Spencer took on the emotional part of an abused woman so tormented by her own past that she failed to protect her daughter from her husband’s abusive grasp, leading to the teen’s murder.
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Spencer's powerful performance as the complex character is just the latest in her versatile acting career. Over the last two decades, she’s played everyone from a doctor on Grey's Anatomy, to one of Don Draper's love interests on Mad Men, and an ex-wife juggling motherhood and a new co-parenting dynamic on NBC’s Extended Family.
To find out more about Spencer’s varied career, read on.
What else has Abigail Spencer been in?
Most recently, Spencer played the role of happily divorced mom Julia Mariano on NBC’s Extended Family — alongside co-stars Jon Cryer and Donald Faison — during the sitcom's 2023/2024 run.
Among the many other projects Spencer is known for was her multi-season role as Harvard-bred attorney Dana “Scottie” Scott on Suits. Scottie was not only the love interest of lead character Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht) in the USA Network legal drama, but she was also one of the few attorneys who could go head-to-head with him in court. Even after the series wrapped in 2019, the show found a new legion of dedicated fans when it hit streaming services like Peacock, making Spencer and the rest of the cast household names.
Spencer also starred as protagonist and history professor Lucy Preston in NBC’s time-travel mystery Timeless for two seasons, beginning in 2016. And during a six-episode Mad Men arc, she played a teacher named Suzanne Farrell who Don Draper had an affair with.
Viewers will also recognize Spencer for her 15-episode stint as Dr. Megan Hunt on Grey’s Anatomy, her role as Gena Brune on True Detective Season 2, and for playing the part of Amantha Holden on the drama series Rectify. Spencer, who got her start on the soap All My Children as Becca Tyree, has also appeared in Gilmore Girls, Ghost Whisperer, Bones, Castle, Hawthorne, How I Met Your Mother, and Reprisal.
When it comes to films, Spencer has appeared in projects including Cowboys & Aliens, Chasing Mavericks, and This Is Where I Leave You.
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Who did Abigail Spencer play on Law & Order Season 24?
On Law & Order's “Duty to Protect" episode, Spencer’s dramatic skills were on full display as she took on the role of Michelle Burns, a successful New York-based filmmaker carrying a devastating secret. When Michelle’s teenage daughter Kaitlyn Lawson (Siobhan McGroarty), a model, was found strangled and beaten to death, detectives chased down every possible lead until they ultimately linked the brutal crime to Michelle’s husband — and Kaitlyn’s adoptive dad — Ron Lawson (J. Anthony Crane).
Ron killed Kaitlyn to stop her from releasing a video on social media that would have exposed years of disturbing sexual abuse he inflicted on her, but he would never face justice. While in court for the crimes, Ron grabbed an officer’s gun and shot himself in the head. The focus of the case then shifted to Michelle, who had not only given her husband an alibi to try to protect him from prosecution, but had also known about her daughter’s abuse for years, and told her husband about Kaitlyn’s plan to release the video, essentially sealing her child’s tragic fate.
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District Attorney Nicholas Baxter (Tony Goldwyn) and Executive Assistant District Attorney Nolan Price (Hugh Dancy) wanted to see Michelle pay for aiding her husband. But the tormented mom’s role in the crime became more complicated after the attorneys learned that she had been a victim of horrific abuse herself for years — both at the hands of her husband, and also by an uncle as a child — and lived in a constant state of fear.
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The case was particularly personal for Assistant District Attorney Samantha Maroun (Odelya Halevi), whose sister was murdered as a result of domestic violence. Maroun argued with her colleagues that Michelle had suffered so much abuse that she “wasn’t capable” of protecting herself or her daughter.
“If you don't respect my opinion on this issue, then I don’t know what the hell I’m doing in this office,” an emotional Maroun told Price outside the courthouse.
After Maroun’s urging, the district attorney's office opted to make a deal with Michelle that would allow her to plead guilty to endangering the welfare of a child in exchange for a one-year sentence in jail.
To keep up with all the Season 24 legal drama, watch Law & Order on Thursdays at 8/7c p.m. on NBC or stream episodes the next day on Peacock.
