CSI: CRIME scene investigation

Season 6 - Episode 17 - I Like to Watch

Written  by Henry Alonso Myers and Richard Catalani
Directed by Ken Fink

When Sofia is called to the luxurious Omni Condos located on the glitzy Vegas strip, she finds a very harrowing situation: twenty-something Christina Hollis, delirious and hysterical, is lying outside her apartment, recently raped and unable to recall the details. When Catherine and Grissom arrive at the scene they are bombarded by hand-held cameras and a reality-television producer from a crime show. Inside the apartment there are no signs or forced entry, but the victim’s bed is in disarray, soaked with sweat and sex stains and scraps of torn, bloody duct tape cling to the headboard.

Back at the hospital, a nurse confirms that Christina was raped in the last few hours. However, Sofia’s hands are tied for the moment as the suspect’s sperm cannot be identified. Christina has no recollection of the night. Burnt candles and a bouquet of flowers found in the victim’s trashcan, make Catherine and Grissom suspect one of Christina’s dates may be at fault. Grissom also locates some reflective yellow flakes near the bed, and a shiny red spot of nail polish on the floor. Meanwhile, Brass questions one of the building’s maintenance men, found with a roll of duct tape, which is then sent to the lab for examination. Hodges finds no match between the duct tape found on Christina’s headboard and that of the maintenance mans.

In the interim, Archie and Catherine are viewing the security tape from the building. While, 37 people take the elevator to the second floor in a seven hour block of time, one man holds a bouquet and doesn’t take the elevator back down. However, he uses a key to enter. Nick pulls two prints from the duct tape, and ties one of them to the cellophane on the bouquet. He can’t find the prints in the system, but finds a Vegas Flower Mart sticker in the trash. Dwight Reynolds is called in for questioning. An intoxicated Reynolds said he went to Christina’s apartment that night and left the flowers outside the apartment. He heard music coming from her apartment, and thought she was in there with another guy. He took the stairs when he left. Reynolds prints fail to match up with those found on the duct tape.

 After a quick chat in Grissom’s office, Catherine tells her superior that Lorazepam, a hypnotic sedative that causes amnesia, was found in the victim’s blood. Hodges confirms that the yellow flakes found at the scene were from a firefighter’s uniform.

 Sara heads to the fire department. The fire chief states that his team was there on the night of the crime; they found smoke bombs on three different floors of the building. However, his team’s uniforms are orange.

 From another surveillance camera’s point of view, Catherine and Grissom deduce that a firefighter in a yellow uniform came to Christina’s condo twenty minutes before the fire crew showed up. Sara and Greg confirm that the fireman had a tank with him; both postulate that nitrous oxide was used to initially drug Christina. Meanwhile, Warrick examines the smoke bombs from two different apartment fires. He realizes that the same person made both bombs. Sofia gets Christina to talk briefly about the night of the crime, and Christina reveals that her attacker had a foot fetish.

 Grissom steps up the investigation by uncovering a chain of woman who confessed to run-ins with the criminal. A Stephanie Daniels met the attacker at her door, when the smoke bombs were placed in her apartment building. While, Tara Weathers claimed to have been drugged in a bar and when she woke up in her apartment the next day her toes were freshly painted; in the same nail polish color that was found on Christina.

Even though the CSIs discover a pattern - their suspect steps up his crimes every two weeks or so - they’re running out of time. The reality crime show producer says that if a crime goes unsolved for 48 hours it’s doomed. The team hopes to prove this statistic wrong as they search for the serial offender.