Law & Order

This episode appears to be ripped from the headlines of the Kitty Genovese case. In 1964 in Queens, New York, Kitty was raped and stabbed to death while many of her neighbors heard her screams for help and looked on, but failed to call the police. Subsequent investigations led the police to arrest Winston Moseley for the crime, and revealed that thirty-eight people did nothing because they thought the two were having a lover's quarrel. This phenomenon, the unwillingness of bystanders to help in an emergency, has become known as bystander apathy.