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Episode Number: 18#
Original Airdate: March 29, 2001
Written By: Eli Talbert
Directed By: Eli Talbert
Synopsis: "A couple leaving a restaurant on their anniversary are killed in the street and their car is stolen. The crime scene is compromised when it rains shortly after the CSIs arrive. It gets more mysterious when the car is found and it becomes a new crime scene. Catherine looks into the collapse of a city owned residence that kills three elderly women. She runs into problems with the city engineer responsible for the building."
Guest Stars:
Brad Johnson as Paul Newsome
Eric Szmanda as Greg Sanders
Reynaldo Rosales as Justin Greene
Louis Mustilo as Knife Expert
Robert David Hall
Eric Stonestreet as Ronnie Litre
Notes:
- This episode was originally titled 'Four Square.'
- The story of the murdered couple sounds very similar to the true homicide of Kenneth and Carolyn Stahl. I don't want to give any spoilers so if you saw the episode, you can google these two names.
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At night, a man and woman come out of a restaurant; they talk as they walk to their car, and it's evident from their conversation that it's their 8th anniversary. As they near the car, we see a cigarette butt fall behind the man's feet; he wasn't smoking. The man opens the car door for the woman; she's grabbed from behind and her throat is slit.
At the scene, Warrick looks at the bodies and comments that the woman is near the curb, but the man is in the middle of the road; the car that was between them is missing. Nick examines the man and finds a red hair on him, and notes that the man's hair is brown. Grissom arrives and surveys the scene; Brass suggests that it's a car-jacking gone wrong, but Grissom points out that car-jackers don't use knives. As he crouches to examine the body, a raindrop falls; it then starts to pour rain, and Grissom yells to his team that they have only a few minutes to collect evidence before the rain washes everything away. The team races around and photographs the scene, and tries to bag evidence. Sara tells Grissom that they're losing everything; Grissom agrees and says that their killer got lucky tonight.
At the scene, the rain has stopped. Warrick examines a cigarette butt, and Nick tells him to not even bother bagging it, as the rain would have washed away all traces of DNA. Grissom asks Brass if there are any eyewitnesses, and Brass points him towards a man sitting on the curb. Grissom and Sara speak to Justin Greene who tells them that he tried to help the male victim, which is how he got blood on his shirt; he says that he was crossing the street and was almost hit by an SUV that came out of nowhere, and after if had passed, he saw the male lying in the street. He tells Grissom and Sara that it's his fault that the man is dead, saying that he tried to help but did everything wrong; he forgot to tilt his head or clear his airways. Grissom assures him that this isn't what killed the man. Sara asks Justin to turn over his clothes to them, as they have the victim's blood on them.
At an apartment building, EMT workers attend to injured people. Catherine arrives and sees O'Riley, who asks why she's there, saying that it's simply a building that collapsed, and there's nothing criminal to investigate. He tells her that part of the basement caved in, killing three old women in their apartment; Catherine tells him that the building is a suspect.
In the lab, Nick finds Greg checking the DNA of the woman that he had a date with last night. He gives Greg the hair from the male victim's body; Greg immediately recognizes it as coming from a cat.
In the morgue, Dr. Robbins tells Grissom that the two victims are Kevin Shepherd and his wife Amy; Kevin has 6 stab wounds in his body; Amy's throat was slit. Grissom notes defensive wounds on Kevin's hands; Dr. Robbins says that he was attacked with two different weapons; one that was long, sharp and double-edge, which had a smooth entry, and the other which was blunt and left bruising around the points of entry. Grissom suggests that if there are two weapons, there might have been two attackers.
Inside the building, Catherine asks for the District Engineer (Paul Newsome), and when she finds him, she watches over his shoulder, asking questions. He asks why she's there; she explains that there are three people dead, then asks who was the last District Engineer to inspect the building? He tells her that he was; she wants to examine the origin of the collapse, which is in the laundry room, in the basement.
Sara tells Grissom that Kevin was a chiropractor and Amy a dentist, and they were married for eight years and their marriage seemed to be a happy one; the eye-witness, Justin Greene also checks out, as several people saw him doing CPR on Kevin, so the crime may have been a car-jacking; Grissom says that they're in the dark.
Warrick mixes plaster for castings of the wounds and tells Brass that it will help them identify the weapon used in the stabbing. Brass tells him that he's looking for Grissom as highway patrol have found the Shepherd's SUV.
The SUV is on the roadside; Grissom comments to Brass that a car-jacker wouldn't dump the car, and Brass suggests that it was just stolen for a joy-ride, but Grissom points out that a person wouldn't kill just for a joy-ride. He notes that the rain would have washed away any evidence on the outside of the vehicle, but there may be evidence on the inside; he opens the door and a woman's body falls out into his arms. Brass opens the passenger side door and checks the woman's bag; he finds her wallet with identification that identifies her as Jessica Hall, as well as her cell phone which is shut off, meaning that she didn't try to call 9-1-1. Grissom notes that she's not wearing a seat belt, so she may not have been the driver; she may have been placed in the driver's seat. Brass says that she may also just be like 28% of Americans, and not wear a seat belt. Grissom finds a red hair on her clothing; Nick arrives and says that it's the same red hair that was found on Kevin Shepherd, but not Amy Shepherd, and belongs to a cat. Grissom comments that this is victim number three, and she may have seen something that she shouldn't have seen.
At the apartment building, Catherine suits up to go into the basement; Paul Newsome tells her that one of his guys could do this, but Catherine points out that since they work for him, they're not impartial. She points out that if a ship sinks, whoever last checked it for leaks is negligent, and Newsome comments that she must not be married, then guesses that she's divorced. On her way into the building, O'Riley stops her and asks if she's sure she wants to do this, pointing out that the Mayor ran on a platform of urban renewal, and wanted to clean out the slumlords, so if anything bad is found, it will reflect badly on the Mayor, and that could be bad for them.
In the morgue, Dr. Robbins tells Grissom that Jessica Hall's body set off the metal detectors when it was brought in, so they're x-raying it; he adds that her cause of death was a laceration to the liver. David runs the x-ray machine over the body; they discover a metal fragment lodged in her ribs; Grissom realizes that it's the tip of the knife used to stab her, and wants to know how soon Dr. Robbins can get it out.
Catherine crawls through the basement, and finds a huge bug, which she collects to take to Grissom. There's a rattling, and plaster dust falls around her; she asks Newsome if the building is secure; he says that it is, and it was probably just an F-16 flying by since there's an Air Force Base nearby. Catherine makes it into the laundry room, where she finds the support columns. One of them has been hit, leaving marks that seem to be from a sledgehammer.
Sara and Brass go to a pawn shop; the owner tells them that the knife tip came from a dagger, probably either carbon or stainless steel. He drips lemon juice onto it; it reacts, which means that it's carbon steel. He then says that a dagger is usually about five inches long, and so uses the tip to draw an estimate of the knife, then shows them a similar knife to what they're looking for.
In the lab, Warrick has finished the moulds; Sara arrives back and tells him and Grissom that the weapon used on Jessica was a dagger; they compare the dagger she has to the castings that Warrick made on the body of Kevin Shepherd, and they match for the clean wounds, but that still leaves the blunt wounds unidentified. Grissom asks for the knife tip, and uses that with the casting from the blunt wound castings; it's the same weapon. Warrick says that the killer started with Kevin, then stabbed Jessica, then went back to Kevin to finish the job; Grissom points out that they now have one weapon and one killer.
Grissom identifies the beetle that Catherine collected from the collapsed building, saying that it eats soft wood; she says that the columns were made of Douglas Fir. She also says that the building was suffering from dry rot, and then shows Grissom the sledgehammer marks on the column; he points out that she's looking for a human, then adds that he assigned her to the case because she's good with people, both living and dead. Catherine says that she knows about the possible problems that they could face with the Mayor, and comments that he could have told her earlier.
Warrick and Sara examine the SUV; Warrick finds three prints on the gear shift knob; Grissom brings in prints from all three victims, and on a visual comparison, Sara confirms that Jessica Hall was the last person to drive the vehicle. Nick comes in and tells them that he has a theory; in the layout room, he tells them that all of Kevin's wounds were to the torso, but he's found some blood spatter on the left instep of Kevin's shoe. Grissom says that people will often curl up into a fetal position when attacked, then asks if Kevin was lying down, how did blood get on his shoe? Nick comments that Amy was too far away, and Jessica was the only other one who was possibly there. He has Sara and Warrick demonstrate; Warrick lies on the floor, and Sara stands over him, but they determine that blood from her stomach wound wouldn't get onto Kevin's shoe from that position, so Grissom tells Sara to kneel over Warrick. This position matches with the blood pattern that is on the shoe; Grissom asks if she was helping or hindering in that position? Nick suggests that Jessica was helping the killer by holding Kevin down, and that she was in on it; Warrick comments that stabbing can be messy, and that the stab wounds that Jessica had might not have been intentional. Grissom tells them to get a warrant for Jessica's home.
In the lab, Catherine examines a portion of the column that was hit with the sledgehammer; Paul Newsome arrives. He tells her that five years ago, a tenant in the building, Blake Neverson from apartment 204, attacked the column because he was angry with the state of disrepair in the building, and was charged for it; it's all a matter of public record. She asks why he allowed the building to pass inspection, and he tells her that there wasn't enough damage to be of concern; Catherine points out that he should tell that to the three dead women.
Brass, Grissom and Nick arrive at Jessica' s home. Nick comments that the lab has confirmed that it was Jessica's blood on Kevin's shoe; Brass adds that there was a call on Kevin's cell phone to Jessica; Nick wonders why he'd be calling the woman who helped murder him. They examine the apartment; Grissom finds a lot of post-it notes stuck on the computer, including one that is for an on-line banking service, with her password and log on identification on it. Grissom bags a blank pad of paper that is sitting by the computer; Nick comes in with a key piece of evidence: a cat that matches the hair found on both Jessica and Kevin Shepherd. He comments that Kevin was probably in the apartment without his wife; Brass says that he'll have the phone records run to see how often they talked to each other. Grissom and Nick log on to the banking site; they find her weekly paycheck deposit, and then one deposit for $35,000 from Kevin Shepherd. Jessica moved the money out of the account the same day, but the account that it was moved to hasn't been posted yet. Nick wonders why Kevin Shepherd would pay to have both himself and his wife killed.
Nick talks to Ronnie in the lab, and has him run tests on the blank pad that Grissom found by the computer in Jessica's apartment. Ronnie gets results that show that there were various notes, some of them inconsequential, but one that says "Andres, 9 p.m." which is where Kevin and Amy had dinner. Nick takes this to Grissom and shows him that there's also instructions about the car, and a meeting place set up for three days after the murder. Grissom comments that it looks like Kevin was planning to have his wife murdered, but he wasn't supposed to die, nor was Jessica. They take the note back to Ronnie, who compares the handwriting and finds that Kevin Shepherd wrote the note, comparing it to the check that he signed for the money paid into Jessica's account. Brass arrives and tells them that Kevin and Jessica spoke on the phone every day, according to the phone records, but more interestingly, after their last call, Jessica called someone else.
Sara and Warrick look through the clothes in the evidence room on Grissom's orders. They find the clothes that Justin Greene turned over to them. Looking at his shirt, Sara asks what a certain pattern is; Warrick says that it's a hand print. Sara tries to position her own hand on her shirt in the same position and can't, then asks if it's not Justin's hand print, then whose is it? Grissom has a transparency of Kevin Shepherd's hand and matches it to the print on the shirt. Sara comments that Justin said that he performed CPR, but if Kevin grabbed his shirt, then he wasn't in a condition that would require CPR. Sara is upset that Justin lied to her and she believed him.
Catherine goes to the apartment building and sees candles and flowers laid out for the dead women. As she stands there, some planes fly by overhead. She goes back to the lab and sets up an experiment. Paul Newsome arrives; she tells him that she's put a section of the floor with the support column in a tank with rubber balls and stereo speakers and tells him that she's going to use this to prove that he's not responsible for what happened. She turns on music and cranks up the volume; the nails in the support column begin to rotate due to the vibrations of the music. She points this out to him and says that the F-16s might be responsible as they'd do the same thing that the music did. She comments that 50 years of fly-bys could have loosened the nails enough to cause the collapse; he asks if she's pointing a finger at the Air Force, but she says no, that's just one factor. There was also the beetles, dry rot, sabotage, and time. He asks if he's off the hook; Catherine says yes, and he points out that she could have saved herself a lot of trouble by not making him a suspect in the first place.
Grissom has the bank documents for all of the people involved in the stabbing, and the team reviews them. Sara says that Kevin Shepherd transferred $35,000 to Jessica's account, which Jessica then transferred to Justin Greene's account. Grissom points out that if this was a hit, then Jessica would steer clear of the place where it was going to happen. Nick then says that Jessica and Justin once had a joint account, and also had the same last name, adding that Jessica hired her ex-husband to do the hit. Sara then says that the next day, Amy Shepherd transferred $70,000 to Justin Greene's account. Warrick, looking at the phone records, says that Justin had called Amy before that transfer took place. Sara speculates that once Kevin had hired Jessica, and Jessica had hired Justin, Justin then called Amy and told her what was happening, and she doubled the amount for him to kill Kevin. Grissom says that Justin probably decided to keep all the money and kill them both, slitting Amy's throat first, then stabbing Kevin. Jessica may have tried to stop him from stabbing Kevin; but Justin stabbed her, breaking off the knife tip, and then went back to stabbing Kevin. They speculate that Justin may have been jealous of Kevin's relationship with Jessica; they also speculate that Jessica managed to get to the SUV and drive off, but had been fatally wounded, so didn't get very far. Once Kevin was dead, Justin discarded the knife down a sewer drain, and then pretended to do CPR on him, which is when he was seen by others.
In the interview room, Grissom and Brass talk to Justin, and ask why Jessica was there, pointing out that usually, a person would hire someone else to commit a murder in order to distance themself from the crime. Justin sits silently, staring straight ahead. Brass and Grissom leave, and in the hall, Brass comments that the Shepherds looked like the perfect couple; Grissom comments that looks can kill.
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