Detective Nick Amaro

Nicholas (Nick) Amaro is a fictional character on the NBC police procedural drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, portrayed by Danny Pino. Amaro is a detective with the Manhattan SVU at the 16th Precinct of the New York Police Department.

background and family

When Nick was little, Amaro's father beat his mother. Nick's father later fled to Miami, Florida; he attributes his firm belief in divorce to this. He is fluent in Spanish, is married, with a young daughter named Zara, and has a living mother, Cesaria (Nancy Ticotin). His wife, Maria Grazie Amaro (Laura Benanti), is doing overseas reporting in Iraq. Since Maria has been deployed in Iraq, their relationship has been somewhat tense, although they always seem to work through their differences. In the Season 14 premiere, Amaro's wife decides to take a job in Washington, D.C., citing that they need a break from each other.

work

Nicholas "Nick" Amaro is a NYPD detective who has transferred to the Special Victims Unit from Warrants and Narcotics. Initially, Amaro did not see eye to eye with his new partner, Detective Benson, mainly because she was adjusting to having him as a partner instead of Elliot Stabler. After their rocky start, Amaro and Benson begin to have a mutual respect for each other and work well together. During his early days in SVU, Amaro has a tough time adjusting to the cases and tells Benson he has the urge to physically assault a suspect, but she tells him the better solution would be to ensure that the perpetrators never see the light of day. In the episode "Hunting Ground", Amaro saves Detective Benson and a kidnapped victim by shooting and killing a man. He is seen visibly shaken as it happened to be his first kill shot. In the episode "Valentine's Day", he sees his wife go into an apartment of a man he does not know. In "Street Revenge", while trying to work a case of vigilante justice, he shadows his wife to see where she goes during the day; he later gets into a heated argument with his wife at the SVU squad room (after going to Philadelphia and assaulting a military friend of hers), and she tells him she is seeing a psychiatrist because she is trying to adapt back into her old life. Amaro is clearly rattled by this and goes as far as to threaten to shoot Detective Brian Cassidy if Cassidy did not tell him for whom he was working undercover. This, along with his erratic behavior, causes the SVU detectives to be very cautious around him with sensitive information regarding Captain Cragen's case. In "Twenty-Five Acts", Amaro seeks temporary SVU commanding officer, Captain Harris (Adam Baldwin), to let Amaro work their rape case solo, telling Benson that she needed a partner she could trust, Benson working the case with Rollins. In the episode, "Undercover Blue", Detective Cassidy is put on trial for rape while he was undercover. Amaro is called to the stand by ADA Derek Strauss and he is asked questions about his undercover work. When Cassidy's lawyer questions him, he is forced to reveal that he had a romantic relationship with the sister of a drug lord he was investigating undercover. Munch then informs him that the NYPD brass is requesting he take a paternity test because the woman is claiming he has a son from the relationship. He goes to the woman's house to confront her, but is denied by her boyfriend. Later, while watching the boyfriend pick his alleged son up from school, he witnesses the man complete a drug deal using the boy. Amaro then meets the boy and tells the woman that her boyfriend is using their son to deal drugs. After Cassidy apologizes to Amaro for what his lawyer did, Cassidy helps Amaro bust the boyfriend for drug dealing. The episode concludes with Amaro knocking on the woman's door and she reluctantly letting him in.

Amaro begins to show great concern when Rollins begins gambling again, and they begin to get close. In the episode "Reasonable Doubt", he comes out of a shower in Rollins' apartment.

Development

In June 27, 2011, NBC announced that Kelli Giddish and Danny Pino would be brought on as the new series regulars.