A famed basketball player accused of a felony, a jewelry-bedecked wife who stands by him, blaring headlines — it may echo the Kobe Bryant case, but it’s “Law & Order.”
In “Law & Order: Trial by Jury,” the newest member in the NBC drama family, fictional forward Ken Jackson is on trial for murdering a lover in Friday’s episode.
Bryant, the Los Angeles Lakers star, was accused of sexually assaulting a hotel worker in Vail, Colo. The charge was dropped by prosecutors after his accuser refused to take part in a trial.
“‘Law & Order’ is fiction,” a spokeswoman for series executive producer Dick Wolf said Thursday. The episode airs with a disclaimer that the story “does not depict any actual person or event.”
In one scene, a defense lawyer counsels Jackson’s wife, Tiffany, to use a seven-carat ruby ring to help repress public displays of anger at her husband over his affair.
“Before you look at Ken, look at that ring. It’s magnificent, and Ken gave that to you,” the lawyer tells the wife.
Three days after he was charged with sexually assaulting the 19-year-old woman in Colorado, Bryant surprised his wife, Vanessa, with a $4 million, eight-carat diamond ring. The ring reportedly had been commissioned two weeks earlier.