( heavy breathing )
Oh, God.
Okay, this is where it got weird.
( crying )
I've processed hundreds of bogus snuff films. But this-- this one just felt different. Yeah, it should. Arterial spray was real.
GRISSOM: It's not fake blood. It's human. That was a murder... on 16 millimeter.
♪ Who... are you? ♪ ♪ Who, who, who, who? ♪ ♪ Who... are you? ♪ ♪ Who, who, who, who? ♪ ♪ I really wanna know ♪ ♪ Who... are you? ♪ ♪ Oh-oh-oh ♪ ♪ Who... ♪ ♪ Come on, tell me who are you, you, you ♪ ♪ Oh, you! ♪
Has this pornographer sent you film to be developed in the past? I'm sure he has. We get raw film from hundreds of adult film companies. No names, just those private boxes. You can film porn, develop it, sell it, buy it, but you can't send it through the U.S. mail. I've got several envelopes here from various private shipping companies. We'll be taking those with us as well. Whatever. ( cell phone rings ) Grissom. It's Brass. I got a DB out on Henderson Road. I'm already on a case. Yeah, well, reconsider. I mean, these ants came flying out of the body. They're taking chunks out of the coroner. The CSI day guy says he's not going near the body again! They're fire ants, Brass. Keep everyone away from the colony. They're evidence. Reconsider. Bring bug spray. No bug spray. BRASS: So a kid was driving along and spotted the tool box. He thought it would look good in his pickup truck. So he looked inside and freaked out. Ran to call for help. Hey... Grissom, have you ever seen anything like this? GRISSOM: Well, any species that finds itself in a place it doesn't belong can do this kind of damage. What are you using? Cortisone. That'll help. You know, I heard that these things can kill a deer. Is that... Is that right? Well, with enough colonies, they can kill people. Yeah. What about our person? Well, only if they also learned how to put him in a box and dump him in a ditch.
( coughing ) Man or woman? Ant hill. They're using this body as a colony site. I'm going to have to take this box and this specimen back to the lab as is. These insects are evidence. I followed up on the private mail depot for our snuff movie. The place has got over 1,000 boxes, no records of renters, and they deal in cash only. Dead trail. Yeah. I got Archie to digitize that film, blow up a head shot of our victim. I find any missing persons that match her description, I'll beep you. Thanks, Sulik.
Find any fingerprints? I should be able to. Imaging components on a filmstrip are held together by gelatin-- same stuff that makes Jell-O jiggle-- but they're smudged. I can tell you that the film was manufactured in 2002 by a big company. Homicide's contacting them now to get a buyer's list. Won't help. Pornos buy "short ends" from legitimate clearinghouses. Saves money, and they're impossible to trace. Really? I pulled a porno ring using teenage girls a couple years ago. Learned all you want to know about the adult entertainment industry.
Hell of a way to go.
I always thought that snuff films were an urban myth. I mean, outside of urban Bangkok. FBI's official position on snuff films in the U.S. of A.? No such thing. What's their unofficial position? Single film goes for 100 grand... original negative. And this snuff filmmaker decided to send his film out to get processed. Greedy doesn't mean smart. ( grunting ) Come on, you bitch!
I'm allergic to red ants, you know. Yeah? I put them on my eggs. They're dead, I hope.
Something tells me that isn't Black Flag. Ecozone pyrethrum. Toxic to ants, fleas, roaches and silverfish. And how does an entomologist feel about putting ants to death? I view them as martyrs in a scientist's holy war. I see. Man without a face. Timeline for death? Hard to say between the insects and the elements. At least a year. It smells more like two. Multiple fractures of both clavicles. Right clavicle healed... broken four months before death. Left was more recent... hairline fractures are still present. Give me a hand turning him over, will you? Here.
What are these? I'm not sure. Sharp impact wounds to the interscapular. Same trauma here in the vertebral. Stab wounds? I can't say. Uh... maybe some round weapon of some sort. What, two feet apart? More like 18 inches.
What?
A pupa case.
Is that a good thing or a bad thing? It's a good thing. If I can postdate the pupa I can establish an entomological timeline. Okay. All right, let's run this back again from the beginning. This time without the sound.
All right.
Stop.
Can you zoom in on his back? Yeah. Can you zoom in on his back? Yeah.
What is that? A mole? Noncancerous. You think? Too bad. The bastard. This room is like a dime a dozen. It could be any room in Vegas. Between the drapes, can you get any other detail outside of that window? Uh... I'll reverse the polarization, see if we can get any more information from this frame. That looks like a blob outside of the window. It's spherical. Blow it up.
Times ten. The Stratosphere Tower. South face maybe? Using that Stratosphere Tower as a point of reference, could you triangulate and pinpoint the street that this was filmed on? I can.
BROWN: What's the deal with this place? SULIK: Hotel's in receivership. The security guy says the elevator still works. Yeah, we're going to need to talk to him. Soon as he gets off the phone with the owner. ( speaking indistinctly )
What's up? Oh, nothing. Only difference between kitsch and beautiful is time.
SANDERS: Heard you're doing a timeline on the ant man. Slow day in DNA, Greg? Yeah. You know, I, uh... I can take notes. Very good. Go right ahead. Week zero: body dies. Week two: green blowflies arrive... and leave their pupal casings.
Week four: black soldier flies move in.
At week 28... they leave their pupa casings.
Now, the presence of winged reproductive fire ants suggests that their colony was in existence for at least a year.
Now, since we found no more pupa casings after the black soldier flies left at week 28, we know that this is when the fire ants must have first arrived. So, calculating the gestation period between ants and flies, we get... Well... one year plus the 28 weeks. Your... guy's been dead 19 months.
Very good. It's an approximation, but it's a start.
Well... Sara, you take that room.
Warrick, you go there. I'll be up here.
♪ ♪
Hey, guys.
We got it.
Somebody moved out all the furniture. And painted the wall.
If they can't see it, we can't, huh? Right.
Arterial spray.
There's a void. Could be a face? WILLOWS: Yeah, maybe. How does somebody cross the line where killing a woman is a turn-on? Oh, I don't think snuff makers cross a line, Sara. I think they start on the other side of it. Biology determining pathology. Yeah, some people were just born bad. Where's that security guard?
SULIK: How long you been a day guard here? Four months. But I don't know anything about this murder you're talking about. Do you know anything about who painted Room 918? No idea. You should try a scalp conditioner. What? Your dandruff. Oh, my bad... primer. Alkyd-based. Never comes out in the wash, but you already know that. Warrick?
You were in that snuff film. You stabbed that girl. I let them use the room to make a movie, that's all. Yeah, we saw you in the movie. You and your nice mole. The guy threw in another $200 if I'd have sex with the girl. She was hot, so I figured why not? Did her and left. She was breathing fine. So when you came back in the room, and you saw the blood on the wall, did you think to call the police? I didn't want to lose my job. Oh, touching. Arrest him. Turn around.
I see you're now learning to cook for yourself. Well, I had to, Teri. I heard you were married. Hopefully not to a criminalist. ( chuckles ): You think I'm stupid? He's a teacher. Well, congratulations. Thank you. So what's the special occasion? I have someone I'd like you to introduce me to.
What? Did I miss some? Actually, yes.
It's a dung beetle. Probably hid in the nasal cavity. The ants ate everything but the exoskeleton. Mm-hmm. So he was probably murdered near some large animals. Maybe a farm or a zoo. Anyway, as to who, I'll leave that up to you. Will do.
Damn. Security guard was telling the truth. There is another guy there. He's almost one and three-quarter inches taller than the security guard. Our minds must have filled in the negative space. Look, the security guard just left the room. You can see the door shadow right there. At the foot of the bed. Yeah. Camera stopped moving. That's because he's not behind it-- he's in front of it. Well, then, that's our guy. There's got to be some way to I.D. him. I have enlarged and re-enlarged every frame. There's no tats, there's no birthmarks, nothing. Well, what about the rest of the room? The film picks up everything there is to see, Catherine. We've seen everything. Maybe there's a short end. What? Pornos use short ends of film, which means they never know when the film is going to run out. Roll out. Camera slows down, the last frame stutters, gets hit with more light.
BROWN: So there's more visual information on it. Right. Good editors always cut the roll out.
WILLOWS: So all your editors' cuttings are in there? Yep. Negatives and unused dailies. Collection guy comes by once a week. Silver on the film makes it environmentally unsafe for landfill, so... Be nice if people were as concerned about the women in these films. I am the one that called y'all, remember? Knock yourselves out, ladies.
Thank you.
Bins of sin. Well, looks like mostly 35 millimeter. Our 16 should have settled at the bottom.
♪ ♪
What the heck is that? What did Trace say? Carbon steel. There was some rust on it. Carbon steel? 19th century. Mostly used for surgical instruments. Well, you found some stab wounds on the vic, right? Underneath all those ants? Maybe it's somebody's old scalpel. This prong-like extension could be part of a repeating pattern. Geometrical extrapolation? That would give us possibilities. You got a pencil?
From the tip down, the slope looks to be slightly curved.
Now, if I extend that trace outward... What do you think? Blade of a saw? Keep doing the math. Maybe we won't have to guess. You see how the base of the fragment curves downward? Suggesting something circular.
Repeating pattern. Circular saw, maybe.
( sighs ) This doesn't seem sharp enough for a saw.
Wait a minute. I've seen one of these before, man. A spur... cheap spur. What's that old cowboy expression? Got to see a man about a horse. Yeah. That reminds me. I got to see a woman about a face. Yee-haw. You notice all the guys in these movies are wearing condoms? Yeah, industry policy. Ever since '98. Even have a quarantine list: who's positive, who's not. And that security guy wore one, too. Pretty surprising for unregulated porn. Maybe she made him wear one. I got it. You did? I got it. I found it. Thank God.
Hot frame, all right. I still can't see who it is. You can see a little more of the room, though. There's a small table and a lamp in the left corner.
Good eye, Sara. Yeah, that kitsch lamp. Somebody moved it out to the lobby. I'll have Warrick go back to the hotel and grab it.
Tissue-depth markers. 21 of them, right? 16, actually. Excluding the five nasal markers. Like I said.
This one's very interesting. The occiput-- the bump on the back center of the head-- unusually flat.
The eyes have epicanthal folds-- a triangular flap of skin that gives a vaguely Asian appearance.
You see how the bridge of the nose is poorly developed? Almost too small for the size of his head. The ears seem slightly odd. Like the nose, they, too, are disproportionate to the head. Almost childlike.
These elements are small for the head, which, in itself, is almost too short and wide.
Your victim was born with trisomy of the twenty-first chromosome. Down syndrome.
BRASS: So I sent out a community fax to every Down syndrome link in Clark and all the surrounding counties-- you know, Special Olympic-type groups, societies, schools-- and I got lucky. Randy Traschel, age 25. Been missing for 17 months. I guess my ants were off a little. "Last employer: Las Vegas Ranch"? Horses. Dung beetles. Hey, where's the tote board? Every time I see a horse, I want to place a bet. Smells like Belmont Park, doesn't it? You ever ridden a horse, Grissom? Nope, just roller coasters. ( horse neighing ) ( cheering )
Howdy. Pete Banson. Ranch manager. Howdy. Jim Brass, Las Vegas Police. This is Gil Grissom and Nick Stokes of the crime lab. What seems to be the trouble? Have you ever seen this man? Yeah. He was one of my stall muckers. Hired him about two years ago. A little slow in the head, but got the work done. And, all of a sudden, he up and disappeared. Never heard from him since then. ( clamoring )
Did he ever ride horses for you, Mr. Banson? No. He just mucked the stalls and went home.
Who mucks your stalls now? Look, guys, am I in some kind of trouble here? A former employee of yours was murdered. Now, who mucks? Enrique. He's an illegal. Shocking. Where is he?
There's the lamp I got from the lobby. The bulb is red... in the film and here. Guy thinks he's Zalman King, playing with the lighting.
Yeah, I guess he was going for a certain look.
You know, if I unscrewed a hot light bulb, I'd probably lick my fingers. Saliva.
Guy replaced it with a red bulb. Got residual saliva on it.
I'll process for DNA, run it through CODIS.
( doorbell rings ) Douglas Sampson? Yeah. The same Douglas Sampson who did three years for sexual assault and battery? ( coughs ) Did. Past tense. We want to talk to you about a recent homicide at the Mandolin Tower Hotel, off Fremont. I'm working.
Take a break.
Take ten. Give it a rest, guys.
I bet I could guess your exact height. What? That guy out front What? That guy out front just confirmed you shot a snuff film with this girl at the Mandolin Tower Hotel. I've stayed there over the years. I never saw her or that guy out front. We've got you on film, killing her. If you had me from any angle I could be identified, you would have arrested me already. ( snickers ) We've got ourselves a film student here. I'm one of the best in adult film, and I'm going to be making the jump to mainstream. You watch. Financed by a snuff film? You have no right to be in my house. I'm not breaking any laws. I have a permit for adult film production. You leave now or I'm going to file a complaint. ( sniffles ) Getting a cold? Maybe you should raise the heat. I'm sure they wouldn't mind.
WILLOWS: Hey, what do you got? This is Sampson's car, right? Some soil up in his wheel well. He washed the tire and forgot the well. WILLOWS: Butterscotch? Yeah. Remember that body dump a couple years back? Yeah. Down near the Colorado? Bidahochy Range. Butterscotch-colored soil. I'll radio the sheriff up there. And the park rangers. Great. BRASS: You never met this man? No. Stop the shoveling. Take a closer look. All I know about him is they call him "Stubs." Stubs. What is that, some kind of nickname? I guess. I hear the cowboys joking about him. I think they call him that because of his fingers. BRASS: Did the other cowboys ever make fun of him? I really don't know.
Do you ride, Mr. Vasquez? Every day. You wear spurs when you ride? When I'm breaking a horse, yes. BRASS: You don't call this breaking a horse, do you? I forgot to take them off. We're going to need to take a look at those spurs, Mr. Vasquez.
Enrique said he got those boots and spurs from Hero's Row. Hmm. That's where the cowboys toss all their unwanted gear. And they just leave them there for anyone to pick up? It's either that or Goodwill. Hmm. Mr. Banson, the Pro Rodeo Association banned sharp rowels on spurs back in the early '70s because they were found to be cruel to horses. Yeah, I know all about that. I don't particularly agree with it 'cause, as far as I'm concerned, horses are on this earth to service human beings. There's an order to things. Well, somebody on your ranch is stuck in the '70s. Do you have any idea who this spur could belong to?
Billy Rattison, pro bronc rider. ( phone rings ) Brown. ( phone rings ) Brown. MAN: Yeah, I think we got your snuff film girl. Where? River's edge, Navajo County. Okay, I'll be right there.
Warrick stick you with post? He's working evidence from the riverbed. You going to be able to I.D. her? Already did from her fingerprints. Susan Hodap, 26. Exsanguination from a transection of the carotid artery. Slicing stab. Any chance of finding any serration marks on the bone? To tie to a knife? Eh, that'll entail a boil, but, sure, I can try. What I can tell you conclusively is that Susan Hodap was already on borrowed time. I tapped her cerebral spinal fluid, didn't wait for a batch, had the lab run it solo. She was HIV positive.
Susan Hodap... There it is. Tested positive six months ago.
I can't believe that porn actors' monthly health records are on the Internet. Yeah, right. The rule is, the actor tests positive twice, they go on permanent quarantine.
Quarantined. That's why she ended up in that snuff film. She got bounced out of regular porn. Walked right into her own death scene. The thing is... porn director may have, too.
( horses whinnying )
This would be a pretty cool little truck if it weren't for the shiny new toolbox. Yeah. And it might be his.
See you boys are back again. Mr. Banson, is this Billy Rattison's truck? Yes, sir. It is. We need to speak with him.
I don't know nothing about no damn retard. He wasn't a "retard," Mr. Rattison. He had what we call Down syndrome. I don't care what he had. Always sticking his nose where it don't belong.
You left this. I left it on the post. I don't want it in my pocket when I ride.
( snuff splats ) ( cowboys laughing ) The, uh... toolbox in your truck-- is that new? Nope. Bought it a couple months ago. Somebody stole the last one. See, we got a big problem with that around here-- the help walking off with stuff. Nick, where did you acquire this photo? Pro Rodeo Association. That is you. Yeah. Do you remember where this was taken?
Looks like Bronc Finals, Wichita, Kansas. Spent a month there training for the finals. But you live here normally, right? Mm-hmm. What month, exactly? ( heavy sigh ) This photo here... uh... March 2000.
19 months ago. STOKES: Your ants put the time of death at 19 months, Rattison puts being out of town at 19 months, yet Randy Traschel's been missing 17 months, so... ( chuckles ) now what? We need a more precise timeline. Yeah... so... back to the bugs? On to the rust. Ah. Damn!
Why are you throwing phone books? 'Cause a beaker gets glass all over the place. What's wrong? It's this curtain that the porn girl was found wrapped in. I've got no prints, no second donor. I've got nothing to link this porn guy to the girl's murder. It's just driving me nuts. I'm fine. I'm sorry. Are you okay? Yeah. You missed me by a mile. We may have something. Really? Right here. I wanted to show you. When he's stabbing her, she's bleeding all over him. Well, the void proves that, but we still can't prove it's him. Yeah, but her blood might. Catherine and I suspect transference. She had HIV. Well, how are we going to get a sample of Sampson's blood? Warrant, based on the butterscotch dirt that you found on his car. Oh. I like that. You might want to apologize for the phone book.
GRISSOM: We sliced the shard into layers of 100 microns to measure the level of oxidation. Moisture from the body hits the carbon steel, and then corrosion begins. And we can be certain that there was moisture right away. So it's like slicing the mold off of bread. And measuring it. The rust penetrated the 13th layer and just barely into the 14th. Archie, run the weather. National Weather Service for Las Vegas. Average relative humidity: 30.29. Temperature: 22.61 Celsius. So, corrosion versus time... May 2000. Spur exposure time was exactly 17 months. And we can testify to this. Missing Persons was right. The ants were off. Yeah, so was Rattison. He was in town.
Two feet. We have reason to believe that the wounds that killed Randy Traschel were made by one of your bulls. That's why we cut the horns-- to prevent such. We're looking for horns with points attached. Yeah. We need to see your other bulls. Curly's the only one I got.
What do y'all want now? BRASS: We're waiting on you, actually. Mr. Rattison, we have reason to believe you were in town the month that Randy Traschel was murdered. Could you tell us what used to be here? My belt buckles. Somebody stole it last year, like I said. You do get a lot of stuff stolen, don't you? Mind if we look around your truck?
Sure.
Don't get any tobacco juice on my shoe.
Got a tape measure?
18 inches. Phenolphthalein.
Positive for blood. Looks like the only thing stolen around here was Randy Traschel's life.
Mr. Rattison, you want to explain this? ( horse neighing )
What you laughing at, huh? You want to come over here and try it?
No, no. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. No!
No, no!
( laughter )
Wait, Billy, wait.
By the way, the definition of the word "retard" is "to hinder" or "to hold someone back." I think your life is about to become retarded.
Okay, one more time, for the record: You have never had sexual intercourse with Susan Hodap? I told you, I've never even met her. SULIK: I know, but I got to ask. You've never had sex with her? SAMPSON: Not ever. SULIK: Okay.
You still have those chills, Mr. Sampson? Feeling hot, achy? Back of your throat scratchy? Yeah, it is. Original flu. Happens at the onset of HIV. Seroconversion. Usually presents two to six weeks after the exchange of fluids. Exchange of fluids? That temperature is your body working up a resistance to the virus. HIV? Me? Come on. You just took my blood a few days ago. A private lab can run a virus test within a day. CDC doesn't broadcast that. Tests are very expensive. We dipped into the budget just for you. You're playing me. I don't have HIV. Susan Hodap had it. The exact same strain that you have. We had that lab do what's called a phylogenetic analysis of your HIV's DNA and Susan's. SIDLE: As you can see, the genes are identical. Which means Susan gave it directly to you. But we never had sex. You did stab her, though.
And, at that moment... her arterial blood hit your eyes, entering your body through the conjunctival membrane. Nonsexual transmission is extremely difficult but, obviously, it's possible. Susan's blood was absorbed into your bloodstream. WILLOWS: Where the new HIV cells immediately started attaching to your healthy white blood cells. Gets inside one, replicates about 2,000 times. Disables the host cell, pinches back out, infecting more good cells... lowering your immune system until your body loses its ability to fight off even the simplest invader. Of course, the strains will have changed by then, and you and Susan Hodap will have a different strain of HIV. The sooner you see a doctor, the better your chances for longevity. But, for now, we got you.
You killed her.
I guess she killed you back. longevity.