This episode is one of the first ones that truly start to spell out that Jack McCoy was sleeping with Claire Kincaid. It was subtly hinted at in past episodes but not explicitly stated. There were clues like in Rebels (1995) where Claire said her boyfriend rides a motorcycle...(jack does).
This episode appears to be based on several cases/incidents:
- The 1979-1981 Atlanta child murders committed by Wayne Williams. A series of murders was committed in Atlanta, Georgia, between July 1979 and May 1981. Over the two-year period, at least 28 children, adolescents, and adults were killed by Wayne Williams, an Atlanta native who was 23 years old at the time of the last murder. He was arrested, tried, and convicted of two of the adult murders and sentenced to two consecutive life terms. Police subsequently have attributed a number of the child murders to Williams, although he has not been charged in any of those cases, and Williams himself maintains his innocence, although the killings ceased after his arrest. In March 2019, the Atlanta police, under the order of Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, reopened the cases in hopes that new technology will lead to a conviction for the murders that were never resolved.
- The 1971-1972 "Freeway Phantom" case. The Freeway Phantom is the pseudonym of an unidentified serial killer who murdered five girls and a woman in Washington, D.C., between April 1971 and September 1972.
- Partially ripped from the Lucio Fulci film Don't Torture a Duckling (1972).
Isiah Whitlock Jr. played five different characters over the course of the series:
- Episode 5.11 Guardian (1995) - Antony White.
- Episode 6.12 Trophy (1996) - Simon Brooks.
- Episode 6.19 Slave (1996) - Fred Oates.
- Episode 10.10 Loco Parentis (2000) - Fred Oakes.
- Episode 11.4 Standoff (2000) - Captain Navarro.
- Episode 15.5 Gunplay (2004) - Gordon Samuels.
Isiah Whitlock Jr.'s character had a store named Gotham Market. In 2015 Whitlock appeared in Rogues' Gallery (2015).