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Minor Character: Las Vegas
The Miniature Killer
Name Natalie Davis
Gender Female
Birth Date 1975
Family Christopher Davis (father)
Unnamed mother (deceased)
Chloe Davis (sister; deceased)
Ernie Dell (foster father; deceased)
Mrs. Dell (foster mother; deceased)
Lionel Dell (foster brother)
Several other foster siblings
City Las Vegas
Occupation Cleaner
Pathology Serial Killer
Status Uncertain
Portrayed By Jessica Collins
First Appearance Living Doll

"This is about her. Her, her, her. It's always about her!"

Natalie Davis (a.k.a. "The Miniature Killer") is a psychotic serial killer who surfaced in the seventh season of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

The Miniature Killer was the main subject of the seventh season, first appearing in the premiere of the seventh season, and finally being identified in the season finale. She would later reappear in season nine.

Background

Natalie's father, Christopher Davis, was a ventriloquist who was often absent, as he was on the road. Since his wife would stay at home to take care of Natalie and her little sister, Chloe, this wasn't a problem. When Mrs. Davis died, Mr. Davis had to stay at home more. During this time, Natalie (who was apparently always withdrawn and quiet) became increasingly jealous of the attention Chloe got from Christopher, culminating at a block party when Natalie pushed Chloe down from a tree house in their garden, killing her. Christopher later cleaned up Chloe's blood off the ground using bleach, while Natalie was standing next to him, causing her to have psychotic (and later murderous) tendencies when she saw or smelled bleach growing up. Foul play was never suspected. Christopher (finding himself unable to take care of Natalie alone) gave her up for adoption a short time later. She was adopted by Ernie Dell and his wife who had a sizeable number of foster children under their care. When Mrs. Dell died, Ernie gave up care of the children, except for his only biological son, Lionel. He stayed in touch with Natalie, presumably as they shared a love of miniatures. In 2007, Natalie snapped completely and started killing.

Season 7

Built to Kill

Natalie began killing with her first victim Izzy DeLancey. Izzy was a retired, washed-up rock-star who employed Natalie as a cleaning lady sometime before his death by her hands. Izzy was struck on the head from behind with a marble rolling pin while he was having a meal. Having the miniature model with her, Natalie then sampled some of Izzy's blood and matched the blood pool. As Natalie had not yet become a serial killer, it was believed to be a common murder. Suspects included his wife, ex-wife, nanny and son, but they all were exonerated.

Post Mortem

Natalie struck again with Penny Garden, who was a terminally cancer-ill, retired cocktail waitress. Her connection to Natalie is never revealed and it is mentioned that she had her nephew clean her house sometimes, meaning she wouldn't have to hire a professional cleaner. Natalie poisoned her favorite liquor with liquid nicotine, intending to have her die of poisoning, however, as a result of the violent seizures that liquid nicotine causes when ingested, Penny Gardens went through one of her windows and had her throat almost completely impaled by the broken glass, dying of exsanguination. Because of this, Natalie brought the miniature back with her, altered it to match the crime scene and had Ernie Dell deliver it to the house, where Penny Garden's nephew later found it.

Loco Motives

Natalie officially became a serial killer when she claimed the life of her third victim, Raymundo Suarez, who worked at the same Mannleigh Chicken processing plant as Ernie Dell. By her account, Raymundo frequently flirted with Natalie whenever she came there. She killed him by knocking him unconscious, placing him in the factory stun bath and activating it, electrocuting and/or drowning him him. Since Ernie was a model train enthusiast and had a bunch of rather morbid miniatures in his house, he became a suspect for the Miniature killings, but was able to counter the evidence against him (he had aided Natalie in making the first two miniatures, unaware of their purpose). Ernie later confronted her about it in private. Natlie admitted to the murders, claiming to have killed Suarez because he wouldn't leave her alone, but didn't elaborate on why she killed DeLancey and Garden and promised not to kill again. Then Ernie confessed to the murders through an email and webcam video to Grissom in order to protect her, killing himself to put the investigation to an end. After this, Natalie sent a miniature of a future killing that would sit on Grissom's desk for four weeks while he was on sabbatical.

Monster in the Box

When Grissom returned, he found the miniature and rushed with the CSIs to find out who the house belonged to. They eventually found that it was Dr. Barbara Tallman's house who was a former psychiatrist who once did pro bono work at a psychiatric institution where Ernie Dell's biological son, Lionel, had been treated. Her link to Natalie is not specified, but it can be presumed that she also treated Natalie at some point. As a result of Ernie's suicide, Natalie became focused on Grissom, adding a newspaper with the date of the murder onto the miniature. It made it appear as though Tallman was to be killed by being smothered with a pillow during her afternoon nap while in actuality, Natalie had planted a time device filled with charcoal above her fireplace, releasing carbon monoxide into the air. As the CSI team had found Tallman before the murder could be performed, they replaced her with a lookalike, Officer Kamen. During the stakeout of the apartment, Natalie's trap went off, killing Officer Kamen by carbon monoxide poisoning. Tallman was later killed by her brother as a kind of assisted suicide, as she had grown tired of living with her Parkinson's disease, having him place the blame on the Miniature Killer. This failed however and he was arrested for killing his sister.

Living Doll

As part of a vendetta against Grissom, Natalie abducted Sara when she left the strip mall that she ate at a few times a week. She tasered her, placed her in her car and drove her out to the Nevada desert and placed her in a pit under a damaged car. Natalie installed a small, battery-powered engine in the miniature and connected it to the Sara doll's arm, having it move as if reaching out for help. This first gave the impression that Sara was to be crushed to death. Later, however, when Grissom saw a weather forecast predicting heavy rain, he poured some water over the miniature, disabling the engine, indicating that Natalie was going to kill Sara by having the rain drown her under the car.

Season 8

Dead Doll

Sara later made it out of the pit and was later saved in the desert. Natalie was then subsequently arrested and then she was placed into a mental institution after having a mental breakdown.

Season 9

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda

After her arrest, Natalie was treated for her psychosis with drugs and worked at the institution laundry room, coming into contact with bleach daily as a way to diminish its power over her. Grissom later found a miniature doll carved out of a bar of soap under the floor of Natalie's cell, depicting her being hanged. It is implied that she was planning to kill herself, but it has not yet been verified if she went ahead with it in the show. One of the CSI novels "Shock Treatment" claims that she had indeed hung herself, but it unclear if this is considered canon in the show.

Modus Operandi

Natalie's victims were killed in widely different manners, including bludgeoning, poisoning, and electrocution. She typically used their habits and routines as windows of opportunity. Why she chose to kill each victim in the manner at the time she did was unknown. However later on, it appears that Natalie has a psychosis regarding bleach and most of the victims were people who had employed her as a cleaning lady where she would eventually come into contact with bleach, leading to her killing someone. Some of those killed may also have had a connection with her foster father. The key signature of the Miniature Killer's crimes is the incredibly accurate scale models that are built to reflect each crime scene. Each model is either left at the murder site, or delivered to someone involved in the case. Every detail was thought out, and to make the models as authentic as possible, the killer even went so far as to add the victim’s blood to the model of the victim. When examining the individual models further, Grissom always found a picture of a bloodied doll. Each photo was hidden among the rest of the miniature. The doll is a representation of the doll that her father, a famous ventriloquist, made in the image of Natalie's biological sister, Chloe, whom Natalie killed when the two were children. In the episode "Lab Rats", David Hodges notices that each miniature had an item that had something to do with bleach, ranging from barrels or vases containing bleach, to coupons for bleach. The reason behind this is Natalie's witnessing of her father cleaning Chloe's blood up with bleach after Chloe's death which gave her a psychosis that causes her to have murderous thoughts whenever she saw or smelled bleach. The majority of Natalie's victims were apparently people who employed her services as a cleaning lady (paying her in cash so that no records of her employment existed). Several of them also had some form of connection to her foster father, Ernie Dell, a model train enthusiast who helped her build her first three miniatures (not knowing what they were being used for). A possible exception is Penny Gardens, whose connection to Natalie or her foster family is never explained.In her most recent appearance, she made a miniature of herself being hung. If she does commit suicide this way, the methods of all her murders (except for that of her sister) spell the word BLEACH: "Blunt force trauma", "Liquid nicotine", "Electrocution", "Asphyxiation", "Car Crash" or "Crushing", and "Hanging".

Known Victims

  • June 1981: Chloe Davis (her sister; pushed from a treehouse)
  • 2006:
    • September 23: Izzy DeLancey (struck on the head with a rolling pin)
    • November 8: Penny Garden (poisoned with liquid nicotine; died of exsanguination when she crashed through her window)
    • December 6: Raymundo Suarez (electrocuted in a stun bath)
  • 2007:
    • February 15:
      • Barbara Tallman (intended)
      • Officer Kamen (incidental; poisoned with a carbon monoxide device intended for Dr. Tallman)
    • May 17: Sara Sidle (attempted; tried to kill by drowning under a car; was rescued)

Victims by Proxy

  • Ernie Dell (her foster father; claimed he was the killer, then committed suicide to protect Natalie)

Appearances

CSI:Crime Scene Investigation
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 #
Season 7 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - X N/A 1
Season 8 X - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - N/A 1
Season 9 - - - - - - X - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - N/A 1
Total 3
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