CSI: Miami

Season 3 - Episode 13 - Cop Killer

Teleplay by Steven Maeda & Krystal Houghton
Directed by Jonathan Glassner

Eager-beaver 17 year-old Patrick Brookner rides along with officer Rich Insko, a seasoned cop sharing his experience with the young wannabe in the force’s pre-training program aimed at creating the next generation of law enforcement officers. During the routine traffic stop of a silver Mitsubishi Eclipse, Brookner reluctantly waits in the patrol car while Insko approaches the Eclipse to question the driver about the auto’s expired tags. Insko retrieves the driver’s license, clips it to the pen in his breast pocket. Shots are fired from the Mitsubishi and Insko crumples to the ground, dead.

On the scene, Horatio realizes that Brookner is missing and fears that he might have been kidnapped by the killer. Calleigh find a partial shoeprint in a pool of Insko’s blood. The license plates entered into Insko’s computer don’t match the wheelbase at the scene, indicating probable stolen plates. Alexx retrieves a small section of the shooter’s driver’s license from the bullet hole in Insko’s vest. Calleigh has already ID’d the make and model of the car from the wheelbase measurements. They know what kind of car they are looking for.

The silver Mitsubishi is soon found and stopped with a spike strip. The driver is a 16 year-old Catholic school student, Missy Marshall. Ryan suspects that Brookner might have been in the car from the odor of urine in the back seat, probably released from fear. Missy says she didn’t kill anyone, that a guy she met that morning, named Jojo, did. Rebecca Nevins interrupts Yelina’s interrogation to remind Salas that she can’t question a minor without the girl’s parent present.

Ryan examines the Eclipse, finding nothing. Tripp brings Horatio Insko’s 9mm pistol, confiscated in a carjacking arrest across town. The suspect, Jake Mann, admits to the carjacking, but not the murder of Insko. Missy, however, ID’s Mann as Jojo. Calleigh believes her. Horatio doesn’t. Calleigh tests the gun and proves that Missy is lying and Mann is telling the truth – he stole the gun off Insko’s dead body. Meanwhile, Ryan enjoys a small victory when he discovers a small parking stub with the name and address of a hotel, lodged in the dashboard defroster vents of the Eclipse.

At the hotel, the Fair Coast, Ryan interviews the manager, Brett Adams, who identifies a photo of Missy and tells him that she’s always there with “her boyfriend,” of whom he has a Polaroid picture, standard operating procedure for all his cash-paying guests. Brett even takes Ryan and Horatio to Jojo’s room and lets them in, where they discover all the accoutrements of a pair of convenience store robbers. Back at MDPD, Missy’s mother, Carla Marshall, a no-nonsense PR mover and shaker, takes control of the situation as her daughter starts to admit her involvement with Jojo. Unwilling to let her daughter implicate herself any further, Carla puts a lid on the interrogation, forcing the CSI team to find Jojo on their own.

Suspecting that Jojo will soon need cash and repeat his mini-mart robbery habit, Calleigh and Ryan begin plotting his past patterns on a map of the city, citing things like paths of least resistance, easy getaway, etc. They identify his most likely next target, but arrive moments too late. The cashier is found bound and bloodied, and Patrick Brookner is also found bound with duct tape, but completely unharmed. Horatio expresses to Tripp some suspicion about Brookner, brought on by the fact that the cashier is beaten yet Patrick, who could easily identify Jojo, is untouched.

Tyler Jensen works to repair the convenience store’s VCR tape, patching it up to a point where it can be replayed. The result is practically unusable, but does reveal one striking fact – Dramamine (motion sickness pills) are visible in one frame, then missing in the next. Given the fact that this mini-mart is half a mile from Bay Vista Marina, Ryan plays a hunch and heads off in that direction.

Calleigh and Delko determine that Patrick actually taped himself up at the convenience store. Questioning him, Horatio learns that Jojo made fun of the kid before taking off, and Patrick taped himself to avoid embarrassment in front of the police. At the marina Horatio and Ryan arrest Johnny Johnson, aka Jojo, for officer Insko’s murder. However, Jojo claims that he didn’t pull the trigger. Black specks on his face indicate he might just be telling the truth. Ryan swabs the specks for testing.

Calleigh completes the testing, revealing gunpowder residue on Jojo’s face. He was the driver. It was Missy who pulled the trigger. Calleigh confronts Missy and her mother, and Missy admits that she did it in order to continue seeing Jojo. Missy is taken away and her mother remains adamant that the whole situation is Jojo’s fault, not Missy’s. Rebecca Nevins tells Horatio that she’s cutting Jojo a deal in order for him to testify against Missy. Horatio is very unhappy about this. Yelina arrives to tell Horatio that Jojo has just been gunned down at the Fair Coast Hotel.

Investigating Jojo’s hotel room, Ryan and Calleigh determine that his killer was hiding in the closet prior to the murder. A divot in the floor indicates that the shooter might have gotten off an accidental shot first, perhaps due to nervousness. Yelina interrupts to report that Missy’s mom was just picked up nearby, driving erratically, with a handgun in her glove box. Carla claims that she thought about killing Jojo, but that she didn’t actually do it. Her gun agrees; it hasn’t been recently fired.

Residue under Jojo’s fingernails turns out to be photographic developing reagent in Polaroid film. Remembering that Brett Adams, the hotel manager, takes Polaroid’s of all his cash customers, Ryan calls Horatio to the site. Brett admits to having an altercation with Jojo over his rent, during which Jojo grabbed at Brett’s ring of Polaroids. Brett denies, however, having a firearm, which would be in violation of his probation. Horatio believes him.

Homing in on the “nervous” aspect of the shooter, Horatio calls Patrick Brookner back in for questioning. Patrick says he was home with his parents all day. Patrick agrees to submit himself and his clothing to testing. A copper shard from the bullet fired into the floor of Jojo’s hotel room floor is removed from the edge of Patrick’s shoe. Patrick’s been lying, again. Murder solved.

Later that day, Horatio and Rebecca briefly discuss the day’s events. Rebecca invites him over for dinner and he declines. She counters with dessert, and he declines again. She asks if this has to do with the deal he made with Jojo. His silent departure confirms that it does, and that they nature of their relationship has forever changed.