When Law & Order: Special Victims Unit got its start, the arrests made by Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni), and their colleagues in the Manhattan SVU were handled by any prosecutor in the District Attorney’s office — which led to appearances by Law & Order‘s Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston) and Abbie Carmichael (Angie Harmon).

But in Season 2, the department got a dedicated A.D.A. liaison: Alexandra “Alex” Cabot (Stephanie March).

Cabot’s introduction was pretty fraught, however… and her Season 5 departure, subsequent reappearances, and eventual career path were even more complicated.

When did Alex Cabot start as an A.D.A. on SVU?

Cabot’s first appearance was in Season 2, Episode 1 (“Wrong Is Right”).

She was appointed to review all the department’s case files by NYPD Commissioner Lyle Morris (John Driver), who was running what was dubbed the Morris Commission — which, in Stabler’s words, was “supposed to be cleaning the department of rogue cops.”

It turned out that, in Season 1, Morris had assigned a forensic psychologist Dr. Audrey Jackson (Audra McDonald) to conduct psychiatric evaluations of all the SVU squad members and was attacking the unit publicly; Cabot was also to be the eyes and ears of Chief A.D.A. Charlie Phillips (Jeffrey DeMunn) for his political reasons and, she admitted, to further her own nascent political career.

She did not initially endear herself to Captain Donald Cragen (Dann Florek) or the squad, though he agreed to trust her after she told him, “I intend to stand on your shoulders to reach a broader constituency. Why would I do anything to shorten my grasp?”

She revealed later in the episode that she was the niece of NYC judge Bill Harriman.