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Episode 7.09 – Power Trip
Air Date: November 24, 2008
A woman looks for her car keys, and hears something behind her. She looks. We see her body placed into a trunk, then her scared face. She appears to be tortured with electrocution.
Eric’s shower, Calleigh’s run, and Ryan’s dropping off his son at school are interrupted by seemingly simultaneous phone calls. They, along with Tara, arrive at a murder scene. For the second week in a row, Horatio’s trademark one-line opening-ender is replaced by a simpler, more apt, “Let’s go to work.” Where’s the cheesy pathos? Where’s the non sequitur? Where’s the attempt at one-upping Frank, that’s just a re-wording or distillation.
Eric tells Horatio that it appears to be a secondary crime scene. There are no tire tracks or other evidence, except for the body. Tara finds multiple burns on her body, and left hand, consistent with strong electrical shock. Tara guesses it would take around 10 amps to cause such burns. It appears that jumper cables were applied to the burnt skin.
(click on “Read More” for the rest of the recap)
In the lab, Tara shows Calleigh that she found no ligature marks or bruising. It appears that she neither defended herself, nor was she restrained. The cause of death is ventricular defibrillation caused by electrocution. Opening her eyes, they notice that they’re dilated. [Tara didn't look at her eyes at the scene or at any time before this?]
Horatio checks up on Reggie, the detective now sitting at a desk. He tells Horatio that Tim Erickson is in with Ryan. He had filed a missing person report on his girlfriend, Kathy Meyers, with a description that matches their victim. Reggie mentions that Erickson has a record, and to check that out. To that Horatio tells Reggie to remember why he’s at the desk…and not investigating homicides.
Tim tells them that they were supposed to go out the night before. The next morning, he called in the report. Horatio asks if Kathy was aware of his sexual battery conviction, and Ryan adds that the person who files a missing person report on a murder victim is often the killer. Scott is outraged by the implication.
Natalia tells Calleigh that there was nothing in Kathy’s tox screen. Calleigh, though, has found high doses of cyclopentolate in the swab of her eye. This would have dilated her eyes, effectively blinding her. This reminds Natalia of a murder victim from a year earlier. Searching computer records for “cyclopentolate” finds the case. Allison Novell, 21, was stabbed and dumped, the year before. The current victim, Natalia notes, was electrocuted. Calleigh says that’s enough to look into. The lead suspect in that case was her ophthalmologist, Dr. Max Paulson, but there wasn’t enough evidence to connect him to the death.
Horatio and Frank question Dr. Paulson. He claims to have been asleep the night before. Frank asks if he got the punch mark and cut lip from the girl in the morgue. Paulson tells them to ask Reggie, since he visited him already, asked him a bunch of questions, and gave him the marks.
Horatio asks Reggie about his visiting, and battering, Dr. Paulson. He says he “put him on notice.” Horatio warns him that he doesn’t need the help. Reggie says he saw the evidence, and knew it was him. Horatio reminds him that he’s on restriced duty because of harassment charges filed in the Allison Novell case. Reggie displays his anger over the charges that took him off homicide. Eric tells Horatio that there is another case involving pupil dilation. Jessica Davis was attacked 9 months earlier, but survived. After Eric leaves, Horatio takes away Reggie’s badge and gun, putting him on leave. He tells Reggie to let him clear this up, and he will reinstate him himself.
Horatio goes to talk to Jessica. Her fiancé, Dennis Chilton, warns Horatio to take it slow, because she was recently diagnosed with metastic breast cancer. Jessica tells Horatio that the department never followed up on her case, leaving her to believed that they had no interest. She said she was attacked while going to class. A man grabbed her from behind, and she must have been knocked unconscious. The next thing she remembers is a blinding light. The man told her to beg for her life, but she wouldn’t “give him the satisfaction.” The next thing she knew she was out on the street. She complains that she’s already told the police this, and no one did anything. Horatio promises that it won’t happen this time.
Natalia shows Horatio all the evidence from Allison Novell’s case, but it has been water damaged. Jessica calls Horatio, telling him that her fiance is gone, and a man is sitting in a car in front of her house. Horatio rushes to go there. Dennis Chilton shows up, and confronts the man in the car. He opens the car door, and sees he has a gun on his ankle. It’s Reggie. He jumps out of the car and grabs Dennis. Jessica comes out, and identifies Reggie as the policeman who took her information, then did nothing about her case. Horatio has already arrived. He calms Dennis, and tells Eric to take him inside. Horatio then tells Reggie to stay away. Reggie indignantly remarks that she’s not safe.
Eric tells Tara that he needs to take photos; infrared photos that should find any deep marks that aren’t visible otherwise. The IR photos reveal marks where the attacker pinched off the carotid and jugular on both sides, cutting off flow to the brain and causing hypoxia. Calleigh notes that they should look for someone with military or other special hand-to-hand training. Eric replies, “Or a vengeful cop.” Eric tells her that Reggie has been all over this case. Calleigh warns Eric to wait until he has more solid evidence before taking this to the rest of the team.
Calleigh gets on the elevator to go down to the garage. A very dejected-looking Reggie is already on the elevator. He wants to know what’s going on with Max Paulson. She tells him that his actions put the department in a defensive position. Reggie stops the elevator and gets in Calleigh’s face, asking her if she wants more innocent girls to die. Calleigh tells him to step away and unlocks her sidearm. Reggie starts the elevator, and gets off in the bottom. Calleigh tells him, though, that she forgot something, and stays on the elevator to go back up.
Ryan tells Natalia that he’s been going over the Allison Novell and Kathy Meyers evidence, and doesn’t find anything leading to the killer. Natalia suggests that they look to Kathy Meyers, herself. They examine what they knew of her personal life, including her three month anniversary with Erickson. Natalia then puts up a close up of Meyers’ face. She points out the signs of “threading”, a treatment she must have done monthly to pluck her eyebrows. She points out that her credit card indicates that she goes to the same place, and had just had the treatment the day before her body was found.
Natalia and Horatio go to the salon. They find Meyers’ car in the parking lot. Her keys and purse are lying below the car door. Shoe scuff marks leave a trail across the lot to another parking space. In the space, Natalia finds drops of industrial grease. Horatio gets a call telling them that there is another victim.
Horatio finds Tara in an alley over another body. She has marks consistent with those on Kathy Meyers. There are visible bruises, though, and hair under one of her nails.
Maxine hands Calleigh a file on the new victim. She’s Rachel Calvado, and has a record for solicitation, possession, and assault.
Maxine notices that Calleigh seems stressed. Calleigh asks if she’s going to run the DNA sample from the hair against the department staff. Maxine wonders why, to which Calleigh replies that Reggie has been all over the case. Suddenly, the computer yields the result. It’s Max Paulson.
Frank and Horatio question Paulson, who says it’s all circumstantial. As his alibi, Paulson produces two movie tickets for back-to-back films.
In the alley where they found Calvado, Frank tells Calleigh and Ryan that an usher corroborates Paulson’s alibi. Ryan says he may have sneaked out the side door and back in. Calleigh, somewhat sheepishly, asks what if Paulson is a scapegoat for Reggie. Ryan wonders if it’s possible. Frank, though, referring to his years on the force with Reggie, says he’s a good cop. He’s only interested in finding the bad guy. Ryan, though, finds a leather strap with a button clasp. It looks like it came from a holster.
Frank and Horatio find Reggie, in his back yard, burning papers on his grill. He congratulates on nailing Paulson, but notices that Frank has his hand on his sidearm. Horatio asks for Reggie’s backup holster and gun. The holster is missing the clasp, and Horatio shows him the evidence bag holding the clasp. Reggie says Calvado was a wothless heroine addict, and he made her life worth something by using her to help save countless other lives. Frank takes Reggie into custody.
Horatio tells Eric that he has pulled Jessica Davis’ case file. Eric says it has been processed, but there are overlapping prints on a button from her blouse. They couldn’t separate them at the time of the investigation, but they have the technology now. Eric separates the prints by isolating them by their distinct chemical composition. One print is methylparaben, which, Calleigh notes, is the primary ingredient in hand lotion. So, it’s likely Jessica’s. The other is lithium grease, the same as found at the scene of Kathy Meyers’ abduction. The grease print matches Dennis Chilton, Jessica Davis’ fianc´.
As police take Chilton into custody, he tells Jessica that he was angry and wanted someone to feel like he did. That’s why he killed Novell, but he couldn’t kill Jessica. He couldn’t do it, because her refusal to give into him showed that she was as in control as he was. After Jessica’s cancer diagnosis, he had to get rid of his anger, so he found Kathy Meyers.
Reggie expresses to Horatio his remorse for killing Rachel Calvado. He’d become “the thing he despised the most.” Obviously dejected, as officers take him out of the room, Reggie tells Horatio that he’ll be fine. In his cell, though, he hangs himself with his bedsheet.
