Lieutenant Anita Van Buren's story of her son (Stefan) watching a PBS show about a "... crazy woman who stabs this guy, spends the rest of the story trying to wash the blood of her hands ..." is a reference to Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth.
Detective Lennie Briscoe attended CCNY.
When hearing "Shelly" Kates' motion to dismiss, the Judge mentions being one of the few jurists who "believes the bloody glove should have been excluded". This is a reference to the infamous "if it doesn't fit, you must acquit" glove from the O.J. Simpson trial.
D.A. Adam Schiff says, "Shelly' Kates could convince a jury that Jeffrey Dahmer had an eating disorder." Dahmer was a notorious serial killer who, when finally discovered by the police, was keeping the body parts of his victims in his refrigerator.
This episode appears to be based on two separate cases/incidents:
- The 1995 Gina Grant college admissions controversy. Grant gained notoriety when her admission to Harvard College was rescinded after it became known that she had killed her mother in 1990, when she was a juvenile and omitted this fact from her college application.
- The 1995 Sinedu Tadesse case. On May 28, 1995, Tadesse stabbed her roommate Trang Phuong Ho 45 times with a hunting knife, killing her. Tadesse also attacked one of - Ho's visiting friends, a 26-year-old named Thao Nguyen, severely injuring her as well. Tadesse then hanged herself in the bathroom.