.jpg?trim=0,0,0,0&width=1200&height=800&crop=1200:800 "Law & Order: SVU pulls episode starring Timothy Busfield after child sex abuse allegations – UK Times")
NBC has pulled an upcoming episode of Law & Order: SVU after charges of alleged child sexual abuse were brought against guest star Timothy Busfield.
Last Friday, an arrest warrant was issued for Busfield, 68, who is facing two counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor and an open count of child abuse.
The actor is best known for playing Danny Concannon in The West Wing and has also appeared in films including Field of Dreams and Revenge of the Nerds.
The Law & Order: SVU episode in question was titled “Corrosive” and was expected to air this week on January 15. In it, Busfield was set to play a respected judge whose life is threatened after an anonymous video is posted to the SVU tip-line.
Every episode of the show, which focuses on a “Special Victims Unit”, opens with the lines: “In the criminal justice system, sexually based offenses are considered especially heinous. In New York City, the dedicated detectives who investigate these vicious felonies are members of an elite squad known as the Special Victims Unit. These are their stories…”
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Deadline reports that the episode will be replaced on NBC schedules by the subsequent episode, originally slated for January 22.
The arrest warrant for Busfield was issued in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where local station KOAT reported that one child told law enforcement that Busfield allegedly touched them inappropriately at the age of 7, according to court records.
Busfield was reportedly directing the Fox crime series The Cleaning Lady when the alleged acts took place, beginning in November 2022. The incidents allegedly occurred around five or six times.
Court documents show that Albuquerque police began their investigation of Busfield in November 2024 after staff at the University of New Mexico Hospital told police it appeared children were being groomed on the set of the television show.
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According to those records, two children at the hospital did not accuse Busfield of sexual contact but did state that “Uncle Tim” would tickle them on the stomach and legs, and that they did not care for the tickling.
Busfield was born in June 1957 in Lansing, Michigan. He has worked extensively in theatre as an actor and director, with Broadway credits including A Few Good Men and Brighton Beach Memoirs.
He has been married three times. He has a son from his first marriage to actor and director Radha Delamarter. After they divorced in 1986, he married fashion designer Jennifer Merwin in 1988 and they had two more children. They divorced in 2007, and in 2013, he married Little House on the Prairie actor Melissa Gilbert.
