The CSI team and Greg return to the lab quite exhausted. Even Greg’s enthusiastic smile has faded. The rest of the team would have a few moments rest while waiting for lab results, but Greg was part of creating them. Everyone else heads into the evidence room and collapses into a chair. Nick cracks his neck; Sara and Warrick merely stare out into space while Catherine taps a pen onto the notebook on the table in front of her.
“Let’s talk about what we know so far,” Catherine suggests, breaking the silence.
“We have forty-six bodies in the morgue, obviously all shot,” Nick states glumly.
“Which means a lot of press and a big push to get this case solved,” Catherine responds tiredly, knowing it will be her responsibility to deal with that.
The room falls into a heavy silence, “We know the perps weren’t standing on the street. What about the buildings?” Sara asks.
“I talked to Brass…” Catherine begins, but is interrupted by a knock on the door. She waves Brass into the room.
“Speak of the devil,” Sara chimes.
Brass just gives her a look and proceeds with the information he has, “I have a list of the owners of the buildings on either side of the block. Small business on the bottom with the tops being rented out as apartments,” he shuffles the folders, “Two of the renters have just reported break-ins,” he shuffles folders again, “You guys are going to love this. Gun shop five blocks down. Owner came in early this morning to find it cleared out.”
“Thanks, Brass,” Catherine smiles, happy to have a lead.
“Don’t thank me yet. The DOT wants to know when they can have their road back. They don’t appreciate have their traffic patterns disturb,” Brass responds somewhat sarcastically.
Catherine looks irritated, “Tell them it’s still our crime scene.”
Brass just nods, hands her the folders, and leaves.
Catherine sighs. She has a much bigger crime scene now than she ever wanted. “Nick, Warrick check out the buildings. Handle the break-in reports first. Sara you’re with me on the gun shop.” They get up, feet lighter at the prospect of getting some answers.
***
Nick knocks on the door of the apartment with a uniformed police officer standing neutrally behind him. Warrick had gone to look in on the other report. Divide and conquer Catherine had said. A blonde woman in her early twenties answers the door. “I’m Nick Stokes with the Las Vegas crime lab. You reported a break-in.” Nick eyes the door suspiciously, realizing that there are no signs of forced entry.
“Yes, please come in,” she responds sweetly. “I’m sorry, my boyfriend already replaced the door. He was so worried with the shooting out front that I couldn’t convince him to do otherwise.”
Nick smiles, trying to reassure her, “Have you noticed anything missing?”
“No, It was really weird. There’s a path of knocked over items that leads to my bedroom, but nothing else was touched.”
“Could I take a look around?”
“Sure,” she smiles.
“Sergeant Bailey will take your statement.”
Nick moves through the apartment. He notes the pattern of fallen items. He stops and dusts for fingerprints at the likely spots a person would use to catch their balance. There wasn’t a clear print to be found. He moves on to the bedroom. Dusts the doorknob and finds more smudged prints. He takes more pictures for reference shots. He then tests the window for GSR. Bingo! And bingo again! One of the nails on the window seal is sticking up. Nick pulls some fibers out from underneath it. He tries dusting for fingerprints, but still comes up with nothing. He opens the window to find a little plastic Ziploc bag wedged underneath. Nick examines the pills inside and shakes his head when he realizes they are Ecstasy pills. He shuts the window and walks back into the living room.
“Ma’am, are these yours?” Nick asks holding the bag up for her to see.
“No, what are they?” she asks honestly confused.
“The person who broke-in must have left them. One of my colleagues or I may visit you again. This may be part of the shooting that happened out front.”
The woman grasps.
“Don’t worry. We’ll keep you informed. What did your boyfriend do with your door?”
“He said he was going to put it by the dumpster.”
“Thank you, for you time.” Nick and the uniform leave.
He heads to the SUV to put his kit down before going to collect the door. Warrick is already there. “Hey man, Whacha find?” he asks Nick.
“Few fibers and Ecstasy.”
“Ecstasy???”
“Looks like our shooters were high.”
“Well, that’s a lot more interesting than what I found. Cranky old women. GSR on the window seal, though. No prints to speak of.”
“That seems to be the common theme. I need you to help get a door and then we can check out the rest of the apartments.”
Warrick raises an eyebrow, but follows Nick anyways.
***
Meanwhile, Sara and Catherine aren’t having any better luck with the fingerprinting. The entire place is a bit greasy and dusty. The various display cases are smashed and the storeroom door has been pried open.
"I’m going to say our perpetrators wore gloves,” Catherine states.
“Yeah,” Sara says, lost in thought, “Shouldn’t a place like this have a security system.”
“You would think so.”
They look around for the tell-tell sign of the key code box. It would have been easily missed if someone wasn’t looking for it, but it was still there.
“Mr. Pedigrew has some explaining to do,” Catherine concludes.
“I’m going to start processing the backroom,” Sara calls out.
“Alright,” Catherine answers while she exits the gun shop. Mr. Pedigrew had been waiting for them to finish on a bench out front. He stands up when he hears the door open. “Mr. Pedigrew, You have a security system. Why didn’t it go off last night?”
“It’s been on the fritz the past few days. It keeps disarming itself. I called the company, but you know how good repair crews are at responding promptly.”
“I’m going to need the name of the company.”
“You think I’m lying,” he responds irritably.
“No, but I still have to verify your story.”
Mr. Pedigrew reluctantly gives her the information. Catherine explains that they should be finished soon.
Inside Sara is photographing the storeroom door. The metal door and doorframe have dents in them where a crow bar like instrument has been used to pry it open. Luckily, at least for those investigating the crime, the person prying open the door had bashed his or her knuckles off the doorframe. Sara finds trace amounts of blood and a few fibers, more than likely from the gloves.
“Any luck?” Catherine asks as she reenters the shop.
“Yeah. Actually, I’ve got blood,” Sara responds, holding up the swab.
The storeroom itself produces nothing for the two CSIs. There are boxes obviously missing from the shelves and various items are strewn across the room, but that doesn’t tell them who committed the crime. They collect a list of the missing inventory and leave.
Warrick, Nick, and the two uniforms are making their way up the stairs to the last apartment. The door is partially open, probably by the shoe that matches the print on the door. The four men stop to contemplate the situation. The first seven apartments had been secured by their owners. Each of them afraid of what had gone on the night before. It was out of place to find the door open and still battered.
Nick quietly suggests, “Let’s go in.”
They all nod and pull out their weapons. The two uniforms take the point. One slams into the door while the other jumps into the apartment yelling, “Las Vegas Police!” Nothing in the apartment stirs. They continue to check out the rest of the apartment while Nick and Warrick make their way inside. The uniforms return indicating that it is all clear. The two CSI’s do a survey of the apartment. It was pretty much the same as the others. They process the scene just to be official; making sure the footprint on the door is carefully taken care of.
“I think its time to head back to the lab,” Nick states.
“Yeah man, this place isn’t going to tell us anything.” Warrick agrees.
They head back out into the living room to collect their kits and dismiss the uniforms. Just as they are about to leave Warrick notices something ground into the carpet beside his kit.
“Hey Nick, I think I’ve got some glass here,” he picks the pieces up with his tweezers and bags them.
“I don’t see anything broken that it would have come from,” Nick responds.
Then the door to the apartment comes flying open. “Freeze, buster,” A middle-aged women shouts pointing a gun at the two men. They put their hands up.
“We’re with the Las Vegas crime lab,” Nick states as calmly as possible, “We’re here to investigate the shooting that occurred last night.”
The woman looks the two men over. She sees their kits and the vests they are wearing. She lowers her weapon, “Alright, but what does that have to do with my apartment.”
“We suspect the perpetrators shot from various windows including the ones in your bedroom.
The woman sits down on the couch to process the information, “My friend has a scanner. She called me at work to tell me that it was chaos in front of my apartment. I spent the night at her house. I never even thought that someone would have broken in here.”
“Are you going to be alright, Ma’am?” Warrick asks.
“Yes, Yes, I need to get my door taken care of. Are you finished here?”
“Yes, but we may be back.”
“Of course.”
They leave.
***
The team is back in the evidence room.
Catherine begins, “We need to connect our crime scenes.”
“Well, the apartments are obvious. We found GSR on a window seal in each of them,” Warrick states.
“What else did you find?”
“Packet of Ecstasy pills, Jacqui’s is checking it for prints. Some glass shards, a few fibers, and a footprint,” Nick continues.
“Glass? Could be from the display cases in the gun shop,” Catherine concludes.
“What a second,” Sara interrupts, “Our shooters were high?”
“Not necessarily,” Nick responds, “One of them could have just dropped it.”
“This could be drug related,” Warrick speculates.
Catherine puts her hand up to stop them, “We’re getting ahead of ourselves. Warrick, Sara check out the glass. We need to make sure these two crimes are related. Nick stay with the fingerprint. See if you can bring us in a suspect. I’m going to hound Greg about the blood sample from the gun shop. Hopefully, that will produce a lead.”
They head out of the evidence room to accomplish their assigned tasks.