'Law & Order: SVU' does the Duggars

Maria Puente | USA TODAY

NBC's venerable Law & Order franchise, which wouldn't have lasted as long as it has without ripping its plots from the headlines, is on form for Season 17. Next up: The Duggars.

An episode next month of Law & Order SVU (Nov. 4, 9 pm ET, on NBC) is loosely based on the fecund family-values family of reality TV felled by sex scandals earlier this year. With twists, of course, just to make it interesting, and with disclaimers, just to cover themselves legally.

"Law & Order: SVU" Will Take On the Duggars in a New Episode http://t.co/Vuv1APuuaZ — Law & Order SUV (@LawNOrderSUV) October 12, 2015

It's a fiction formula that's worked for years: 20 seasons for the original L&O, and now going into 17 years for the Special Victims Unit spin-off, which focuses on sex crimes.

It was inevitable: The series' two-hour premiere episode last month was based on the Robert Durst case (New York real-estate heir suspected of murder) and The Jinx, HBO's documentary series based on the deeply strange story of Durst.

And this week's episode, "Community Policing" (Oct. 4), sounds all-too-tragically familiar, too: The NYPD falls under seige after the shooting of an unarmed black man.

Wednesday on #SVU, a country is divided. pic.twitter.com/eKyNXLpaim — Law and Order: SVU (@nbcsvu) October 12, 2015

"In the pursuit of an SVU rape suspect, detectives from another precinct shoot and kill an unarmed black man. As racial tensions rise in the city, Barba (Raúl Esparza) is tasked to indict three officers who claim they had no choice but to follow police procedure," according to the show's description of the episode.

The Duggars were a juicy target for the ever-adapting writers of L&O, after the shocking fall of the family and the cancellation of their hugely popular series on cable network TLC, 19 Kids and Counting, this summer.

In the episode "Patrimonial Burden," the squad investigates a famous reality TV family of 10 children after it's discovered the virtuous 13-year-old daughter is pregnant, according to the show's description of the episode.

So, not just the Duggars but a few allusions to the story of Sarah Palin's daughter Bristol Palin, whose unwed teen pregnancy embarrassed mom during her 2008 vice-presidential race. (Bristol is about to be an unwed parent again with baby number two on the way.)

The Duggar-related plot, as it is with many of the show's plots, is about hypocrisy, sex and secrecy, plus possible crimes.

The real-life Duggar story earlier this year hit most of those plot points square on: Christian conservative family-turned-TV-stars is deeply damaged and their show cancelled after tabloid revelations that eldest son Josh Duggar molested girls, including his sisters, as a teen and his moralizing parents kept it hushed up until the statute of limitations expired. Then, Josh also confesses to hypocrisy, infidelity and porn addiction as an adult after he was revealed to have accounts on the Ashley Madison marital cheating website.

E!, which is owned by NBC parent company NBC Universal, reported that Peter Scanavino, Detective Carisi on the show, told reporters on the set of SVU prior to the season premiere that the Duggars' story was obvious plot material.

"With the Duggar one, it was like the double-whammy because it was his sisters and the fact — I mean, honestly, I feel like we're dealing with some topics this season that feel a bit meatier than some lunatic fringe family," Scanavino said. "I wouldn't mind doing one just because I have never been so infuriated with someone's level of hypocrisy, and lying, and then displacement of responsibility onto something else. When I think about that guy, it boils my blood."

Also, in April, an SVU episode dealt with the campus rape crisis and in particular the now-retracted Rolling Stone story about a particular accuser's story at the University of Virginia.

In the episode, a college student accuses several co-eds of rape in a newscast, which leads the detectives to investigate, but the accuser's story keeps changing until it’s revealed that it was false.

By the way, the Duggars are not completely banished from TV: TLC has announced it will air specials later this year featuring two of Josh Duggar's sister victims, Jill and Jessa and their husbands and children.