Redrum


Redrum

Season	7
Number	13
Writer	Richard Catalani (story) David Rambo (story) Jacqueline Hoyt (teleplay) Carol Mendelsohn (teleplay)
Director	Kenneth Fink
Original Airdate	January 25, 2007
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Redrum is the thirteenth episode of season seven of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

Plot

In order to snare a major drug dealer who has gone into hiding after killing a politician, Catherine, Keppler, Brass and McKeen initiate a reverse forensics operation to stage a crime scene and lure him out. Unfortunately, this proves difficult when the other CSIs start seeing through the bluff.

Synopsis

A Nevada politician, Danilo Zamesca (from the "A Bullet Runs Through It" two-parter), is shot and killed in his parked car in the outskirts of Vegas.

On the scene, the CSIs find a torn photograph of him apparently using drugs, which would have been damning for his career since he had made it his mission to fight drug dealing, and a dropped soda cup on the ground.

The crime lab processes the evidence and find a fingerprint on the cup's straw and shell casings from the 9mm used which turn out to belong to Simon Thomas, the biggest drug trafficker on the west coast.

When LVPD try to pick him up at a club he owns, he turns out to have been gone for weeks.

At a breakfast, Catherine, Brass, Keppler and McKeen discuss the case and Keppler suggests something radical to lure Thomas out into the open: reverse forensics, i.e. faking a crime scene.

Catherine and Brass are sceptical about the idea since it will involve deceiving their colleagues, but McKeen immediately becomes interested and the plan goes into motion.

While the rest of the team are on other assignments, Catherine, Brass and Keppler arrange the fake crime scene, planning to recreate the Zamesca scene and make it look like the same killer was responsible for another murder.

Sara investigates the death of a woman named Monique Carter, an ex-lawyer who appears to have died of a drug overdose, however, the autopsy reveals that she was killed by blunt force trauma to the head and her arm was shot up with drugs post-mortem to make it look like an overdose.

In the meantime, Catherine and Keppler make a plan to create a crime scene Brass hires a small-time drug dealer, Edwin "Rat" Dennison, to serve as their patsy in exchange for getting a new life elsewhere. The group has a narcotics cop, Ezekiel Holstein, serve as the fake victim.

In addition to recreating the tire tracks and shoe prints from the Zamesca crime scene, they recreate the bloody car by spraying the inside with Holstein's blood, taking crime scene photos of him covered with his own blood and then throwing a spent 9mm slug covered with it inside after breaking the window.

Meanwhile, Sofia Curtis continues investigating the Monique Carter case. While questioning her landlord, she learns that Monique was living with someone, but he doesn't know his name.

In the meantime, the case starts to deteriorate when Nick discovers a connection between Monique Carter and Zamesca.

The tattoo on her arm is the same as that of a woman in the torn photo and a piece of seat material is the same as that of a fragment found in the sand at Zamesca's crime scene.

Nick becomes suspicious of Catherine when she ignores the evidence in order to stick to her fake crime scene, even more so when he watches a press conference in which McKeen announces that Dennison has confessed to killing Holstein as well as Zamesca.

The fake case crumbles even more when Warrick examines the slug that supposedly went through Holstein's skull and is surprised to find that it is covered in blood, but doesn't have any bone or glass stuck to it as it would have if it went through the window and a human skull.

When Nick looks deeper into the case and, unable to find the Holstein case file or evidence, is warned off by Catherine, he gathers the other CSIs and they decide to dig deeper on their own.

Out of fear that Catherine, Keppler and McKeen have somehow become corrupt, they investigate behind their backs. When Nick looks at the bloody car, he discovers that there is no brain matter on skull fragments anywhere inside.

An examination of the blood sampled from the scene reveals that it had had anti-coagulants added to it to keep it from clotting. Finally, Warrick discovers that the car's window was smashed with a sparkplug and not a bullet.

Meanwhile with Thomas Simon out in public again, Brass arrests him for Zamesca's murder and finds a 9mm handgun on him.

Unfortunately, that becomes the moment that the case collapses as McKeen failed to properly in form the district attorney and, unable to separate the fake case from the real one, she decides not to file charges.

With the fake case gone, Catherine and Keppler tell the truth to the rest of the team, who are less than pleased to find out.

The team then pursues the Monique Carter case full-time, hoping to tie Thomas to her. Her cell phone records show that it was used to call several associates of Simon after her death.

When Sara and Nick search her apartment, they find his fingerprints on her pull-out bed.

To seal the deal, they find Monique Carter's hair and blood on the gun's handle. In the end, Thomas Simon is charged with her murder.

On another bright note, a piece of legislation to fight drug dealing sponsored by Zamesca before his death is passed into law.

Trivia

Hodges comments to Nick that Keppler & Catherine's mysteriousness implies an Internal Affairs investigation so much so that the department has started a pool on who is being investigated. The top three in the pool are claimed to be (in order) Nick, Hodges & Grissom.
When Nick is in Hodges' lab and prints a result, for the first time the laser printer outputs the result with the upside down (like a normal printer will do). *In all previous times and episodes the laser printers of the lab always printed the pages with the face up something that no laser printer does. In the first seasons of CSI (mentioned before) the laser printers was also making a dot-matrix sound-like.

Goofs

In different moments, in all shots in the fake crime scene you can see the reflection of the shooting (filming) team in Brass' and Keppler's sunglasses. You can even see two big white objects that from the reflection seem to be in front of the actors all the time, even when they move. These are used to help redirect both natural and lamps to help light the scene.
Supposedly, Keppler smashes the car window with a spark plug, but if you look closely, he actually appears to use some kind of metal pipe.
When Keppler takes the SIM card out of the phone after calling 911 the card is backwards. The golden platine should be on the lower side, not the upper side. Also the card wouldn't fit in that way because one corner of the card is generally cut so people can insert the card only one way. Even if he could get the card in that way, the phone shouldn't work because the pins can't connect to the platine.

Quotes

Undersheriff McKeen: Alright, which one of you screwed this up?

Brass: I'm looking at him. You dropped the ball, man. You never cleared this with the D.A and now she says she can't tell fact from fiction. She's not gonna file charges against Simon.

Undersheriff McKeen: She's a tight ass. I told her what I thought she needed to know.

Brass: Did you hear what I said? Now what're you gonna tell the Sheriff?

Nick (to Catherine): I can't find the evidence in the Holstein case.

Catherine: What do you want it for?

Nick: Because that guy who confessed to killing Zameesca didn't do it. The sheriff's jumping the gun.

Catherine: We have evidence and a confession, you can't just come in here and take over my case.

Nick: Is there a reason that you don't want me to see that file, Catherine?

Catherine: Nick, as your supervisor, I'm ordering you to back off.

Catherine: I grew up in this town, I know all about playing the odds, you are gambling with my team.

Keppler: We talked about the risks going in, it's not like we can quit now.

Catherine: I'm not quitting, but I don't like it. And I hate lying to my guys.

Sara: You know... I really hate deceiving people, because eventually you get what you give.

Warrick: I hate being deceived.

Keppler (to Catherine): If we do our job right and catch the guy, no one will remember the rest.

Catherine (quieter): I'll remember.

Sara: Uh, it's freezing why are we having a meeting outside?

Nick: Because Catherine and Keppler are in there.

Greg: Have you guys been listening to Hodges?

Nick: No and this isn't about Keppler being IA anyway, this is about Catherine having a false confession and standing by it.

Warrick: You'd better be able to back that one up, man.

Nick: Zameesca knew Sara and Greg's vic. He's dead, she's dead. Same drugs are found at both crime scenes. And then those same drugs were found at your crime scene?

Warrick: Could've came from the same supplier.

Greg: We see that all the time.

Nick: I don't think it's a coincidence.

Sara: You know, Catherine... (looks around) Catherine ordered Henry to step out of his lab without putting drug evidence away.

Greg: Why would she do that?

Warrick: I did see Keppler checkin' out Zameesca's file the yesterday, I didn't think anything strange of it then, but now...

Sara: Okay, so maybe there is a IA investigation.

Nick: I can't find the Holstein evidence.

Sara: What?

Warrick: Catherine put it in the temporary locker.

Nick: Yeah but why didn't she put it where it belongs?

Warrick: The Holstein bullet is a little too clean and Keppler didn't seem at all concerned about it, he said we'd see it in autopsy.

Nick: It's kinda hard to have an autopsy when you don't have a body, man. I talked to Doc Robbins and he's still tryin' to track it down. And the mortuary has no record of Catherine's call whatsoever.

Sara: Do we have access to any of the Holstein evidence?

Warrick: We got the car. (laughs and realizes) Catherine sent it to the impound.

Greg: Well, at least we know where it is.

Nick: Alright that's it, we're a team now, the four of us. We can't trust Catherine and we can't trust Keppler. I'm serious, I'm going to roll with this one.

Warrick: I'll roll wit'chu. You? (looks at Sara)

Sara (pauses): I'm in. (all look at Greg, he looks around nervously and then nods/shrugs)

Main Cast

William Petersen as Gil Grissom (credit only)
Marg Helgenberger as Catherine Willows
Gary Dourdan as Warrick Brown
George Eads as Nick Stokes
Jorja Fox as Sara Sidle
Eric Szmanda as Greg Sanders
Paul Guilfoyle as Jim Brass

Recurring Roles

Robert David Hall as Dr. Al Robbins
Louise Lombard as Detective Sofia Curtis
Liev Schreiber as Michael Keppler
Wallace Langham as David Hodges
Conor O’Farrell as Undersheriff Jeffrey McKeen
A. Martinez as Assemblyman Danilo Zamesca
Gerald McCullouch as Bobby Dawson
David Berman as David Phillips
Jon Wellner as Henry Andrews
Larry M. Mitchell as Officer Mitchell

Guest Stars

Adam Nee as Edwin 'Rat' Dennison
Darris Love as Ezekiel Holstein
David Fabrizio as Thomas Simon
Suzy Cote as Monique Carter