- Man, what are you doing ? - I got some change here.
Hey, get off !
Hey, hey, what are you doing to the money there ?!
Get off !
You know what's great about the San Gennaro Festival ?
Mmm. The constant throng of rubberneckers,
or the fact that your crime scene is already contaminated
before you get the call ?
The cannolis.
All right, I'll tell you what.
We figure out who killed this guy and the cannolis are on me.
Deal.
We have witnesses ?
We've got suspects.
The guys over there swear that he was trying to rob
the statue of San Gennaro.
Fresh body in Central Park.
Fresher than this one ?
I'll take a rain check on the cannolis.
Nice, so I'm solving and buying ?
Exactly.
He have anything interesting to say ?
His name is Jared Stanton.
He lives at 73rd Street and Park Avenue.
You can just say 73rd and Park. New Yorkers
know what you mean.
No sign of disturbance. Flies
seem to have been here a while.
I'm thinking the time of death is sometime in the pre-dawn hours.
So Jared Stanton walks into Central Park
when it's still dark, takes a seat on this bench,
and offers no resistance when he's killed.
I know, it doesn't make any sense.
Don't quote me on this, Lindsay, but
sometimes...
not everything's connected.
Corporate Warriors
The killer must have put the head back on.
Dried blood around the wound might explain how he kept his head on straight.
What can you tell me about the murder weapon ?
Basically transected everything.
There's a slight angle to the cut,
moving from right on the lower side, to higher on the left.
This is clean.
Clean doesn't begin to describe it.
I mean, there's no hack marks, no stutter marks,
no evidence of an electric blade.
There's no trace in the wound track.
Very few weapons could make a cut like this.
Yeah, did you find any guillotines at the crime scene ?
Ten years old.
Trying to get to the window.
We canvassed the building. Nobody
saw anyone suspicious.
You find his parents ?
His dad's dead. Mom was at work. She's on her way.
That's rough. You're sitting at work and you get a call
that your son is dead from smoke inhalation...
That official cause of death ?
Soot and debris in his mouth and throat.
Most likely has elevated levels of carboxyhemoglobin.
Burned worse than any other part of his body.
Means he tried the door first.
That kid can't weigh more than 70 pounds.
He would have gone under pretty quick.
Closed door, open window ?
He should have had plenty of time to get out.
Something's not right here.
He wasn't beaten to death ?
That's just salt in the wound. Punches all came after the fact.
They're postmortem.
But this,
pierced the sinoatrial node,
disrupting his heart's electrical impulses.
It's your murder weapon.
It's inconsistent with the evidence we found at the scene.
Maybe San Gennaro wasn't the main event for this guy.
- What did you get on his prints ? - Didn't get me anywhere.
I'm gonna have to run his knuckles, but wait till you see this.
Manos de piedras.
"Hands of stone."
That's what they used to say about the boxer Roberto Duran.
Same goes for this guy. Except his hands are surgically enhanced.
You take the bone tissue from the pelvis
and fuse it with the bones in the hand.
- Why would somebody have that done ? - I don't know, but...
the guy would have packed one hell of a punch.
Unfortunately, he was too dead to use it.
Hey, Stella, you know what's the greatest about the San Gennaro ?
The cannolis.
Yeah. So you got a guy stabbed in the heart,
and our suspects who gave him a beating after the fact.
Any chance one of the suspects did the stabbing ?
Well, we didn't find anything like the murder weapon at the scene.
And nothing like it on our suspects.
- You know what the weapon was made of ? - Here we go. Cocobolo.
That was the standard issue wood for NYPD nightsticks in the '80s.
Comes from down in, uh...
The Pacific seaboard of Mexico and Central America.
Valued for being a hard wood. It's current uses include
tool handles, canes, pool cues.
It's also one of the most important woods used in cutlery.
If you've got a knife, why cut off a three inch piece of the handle to stab someone ?
Yeah, maybe the GCMS as the answers.
I took three samples of the clothes earlier today.
What you got ?
I'd say we're looking at oranchina...
torrone...
That would be caponatina.
Rice balls, almond candy
and... relish.
All specialty foods served at San Gennaro.
Okay, we know where our vic ended up and it looks like
the clothes are going to help us figure out where he started.
Fire Chief wants your report soon as you have it.
There's the V pattern.
Yeah, that's the point of origin.
The fire started there.
No outward sign of accelerants.
Screws are loose.
I've got trace.
- You already thinking arson ? - There's a reason James Walker's dead.
And this...
is going to help tell me why.
Karen, we shouldn't be here.
He's my son. I left him home.
It's not your fault.
Ma'am, you need to go back outside.
- I want to know what happened. - As soon as we know something.
No, I'm not leaving till I know.
Do me a favor, take Miss Walker downstairs. Thank you.
Miss Walker, I'm Sheldon Hawkes from the Crime Lab.
We're still examining the scene so you can't be in here.
But you can
call me at the lab.
- You have a place to stay, ma'am ? - With my boyfriend.
Thanks.
Come on. Let's go to my apartment.
Did you learn that in one of your forensic textbooks ?
Come on, her son just died.
I'm usually the one who hands out cards.
Is this a turf thing ? You're the detective, I'm the scientist ?
The last thing you need is your phone ringing off the hook at the lab.
You start handing your card out at every scene...
Okay, this is where we found our vic.
So with that wood in his heart, he should have left some kind of blood trail.
Which would be impossible to find with all this foot traffic.
Right, so we stick with our clothing trail.
Where do we start ?
O ranchina.
How you doing ?
All right ?
That doesn't look edible, huh ?
No, it's consistent with blood.
So it's safe to say that our vic fell into this
stand just before he died.
Keep tracking backwards. Where did he come from before he got here ?
Torrone.
Caponatina.
That's the end of our food trail.
We're clear of the pedestrian traffic.
I got blood.
Nice.
Huh.
Another use for our cocobolo wood.
Pool cues.
What are you looking at ?
I bet you know the answer to that question.
We're closed.
Yeah, well, your hours just changed.
- Come on, Maddy. - Do you mind ?
Yes. You look like you done enough damage for one day.
I am the victim !
I just put in a new floor
and fresh paint. Look at this place.
- You said you were in the bathroom ? - I heard a racket.
So I come out.
That's what happened.
Thank you.
You believe a word of that ?
All I know is, we've got to process this place from top to bottom.
Starting at the top.
I cannot believe the evidence is
gonna back the pool lady's story,
but it was a perfect tread impression on that ceiling.
And the killer splinter
came from this cue.
So, we're looking for a combination of
Spider-Man and Minnesota Fats.
Check for prints ?
I'm about to. Could be a lot of people on this.
The game actually works in our favor, 'cause the shooter
holds it here and then
cradles it down there, you know ?
Got it, but if you're gonna be using it in a fight...
Ooh... So the rumors are true.
No more Bowery Billiards for a while.
- Why, you play down there ? - Sometimes.
I mean, I still like Corner Billiards on Eleventh, but...
Pulled serial numbers from the screws
in your vic's knuckles.
Tracked them back to Trinity Hospital.
Got an ID.
Nothing on the clothes.
Well, how'd you know that's what I was gonna ask ?
Process of elimination.
We haven't worked together long enough for you to ask about anything else,
so you must be here about the case,
and you're asking me how I knew that's what you were gonna ask,
to hear if a thought process proceeds an answer.
Which it does. Go on.
The clothes have nothing, but
this is interesting.
I pulled this from a flash drive in his pocket.
American Pacific Worldwide.
A financial services company.
In the same way the Yankees are a baseball team. What's it say ?
Basically, Paul Martin,
the CEO, was cooking the books to keep the stock price high.
The vic knew it and was gonna send this memo to the board.
I'd say that speaks to motive.
It is a cut-throat business.
This is a confidential, internal memo.
Found on the dead body of Jared Stanton,
one of your employees.
Jared wasn't just an employee.
He was my Chief Financial Officer
He also knew you were artificially manipulating
your company's stock price,
and he was gonna inform your board.
I don't believe you're in a position to know that.
You don't have access to the full breadth of APW's financial records.
No,
but I do have access to your office.
A warrant for any and all weapons possibly relating to the death of Jared Stanton.
I thought I might have to search a little harder.
Never seen a personal collection like this.
These are decorative artifacts.
They're deadly artifacts.
The kama.
When farmers were forbidden to own weapons,
they developed this from a sickle used to cut rice.
Increased curvature of the blade means more cutting power to remove limbs.
The fighting fan.
Carried in ancient times by female courtesans.
Blades were inserted in the tips,
which could be used to sever the jugular vein.
Chinese spear.
The red horse hair below the blade
is used to distract an opponent.
You know your weapons.
Because they help me know my killers.
How's your fire going ?
I've got bad news, good news, and a question.
Well, take it in order.
The bad new is, it wasn't an accident.
If the fire was electrical, these would have burned from the inside out.
Since they burned outside in...
We're looking at arson.
Good news is, I pulled trace and ran it through the GCMS.
And your question is ?
About to be answered.
Or not.
"Compounds consistent with potatoes and vegetable oil."
Along with the salt the XRF picked up,
all found inside and outside the socket,
and without any usable prints, I'm not sure where that leaves me.
Most likely reconstruction.
Thinking outside the box.
That's what we're doing, right ?
It's more like thinking inside the car.
A potato chip bag.
It's a method used to start automotive fires.
Uses minimal trace and allows someone to file a fraudulent insurance claim.
Light the bag on fire and watch it go.
All right, tells us two things.
First, how the fire started,
second...
The guy ate a few chips before he torched the place.
Who uses snack food to start a fire in an apartment ?
I'll tell you when I read your report.
Greg Thompson.
Wow.
Our San Gennero vic looks like he was on a Star Trek diet.
You know, the kind where people evolved past the point of actually
needing to eat real food ?
I think the Italians got it right.
Live to eat, not eat to live.
That's what I'm talking about.
Come on, where's the love in all that stuff ?
That's right.
Chair's knocked over.
Screen is on the ground.
All signs of a struggle.
I got spatter.
Nice.
He was going at it pretty good with someone.
Looks like he was going at it pretty good over here, too.
Okay, so, the fight started here.
And he goes to the pool hall.
Then they end up at the San Gennero.
So, we tracked the murder all the way back to the beginning.
Huh, maybe not all the way.
That's the same place the vic in Mac's case worked.
Huh.
One step forward, two steps back.
All the way to American Pacific Worldwide.
Okay, so we have two dead employees from the same company
Greg Thompson, the Chief Operating Officer,
and Jared Stanton, the Chief Financial Officer.
Both of whom work directly under one man.
Paul Martin, the CEO.
Who has an office full of possible murder weapons.
Excuse me, sir.
Well, that may work for your decapitation vic,
but my vic took a wood splinter to the heart after a martial arts extravaganza.
Paul Martin has a Black Belt, Fourth Degree.
Makes him capable of both murders.
Why would a CEO kill his right-hand men ?
Is that koan ?
Is that what ?
The Buddhist method of-of thought.
Where are you going ?
Cutting to the chase.
Tameshigiri.
Test cutting. Rolled tatami man in water. Simulates resistance.
So, is that the murder weapon ?
When you train with weapons, they tell you about yourself.
When you're a detective, they tell you about the people you're looking for.
Weapons as fingerprints ?
This is a unique one.
The katana.
Takes a lifetime of training to master.
Curvature of the blade concentrates a force of impact on a precise area.
To cut through, you use a push-pull system.
You push down with the top hand and pull with the bottom.
One cut...
one kill.
Cut moved high to low,
opposite of Jared Stanton.
But the blade moved right through.
No tool marks.
Exactly like Jared Stanton.
So if you have a corresponding absence of tool marks, what does that get you ?
A trip back to wherever the sword came from.
Let me know how it goes.
Computer Crimes tracked down James Walker's Internet records.
He was online five minutes after someone called in the fire.
Guess what he was doing ?
Playing chess.
How'd you do that ?
Plaque, chess pieces.
- How do you leave a ten year old alone ? - Mom had to work.
Kids don't even need to look for trouble to find it.
James was probably lost in what he was doing.
Smoke inhalation creeps up on you.
By the time you've realized it, asphyxiation.
- Who was he online with ? - I don't know. Still working on it.
Let me know what you find.
Anyone could have taken the katana from my office.
Well, not everybody would know how to use it.
True.
You don't seem very upset about the fact that two of your employees are dead.
Because now is not the right time to mourn them.
The market is watching,
and I plan to continue the meaningful course of business
that both Greg and Jared were committed to pursuing.
Greg Thompson was committed to a little more than meaningful business.
Greg was extremely diligent...
both in his training and in his work.
His training ?
All APW executives train together.
It fosters camaraderie as well as competition.
And what about Jared Stanton ?
- Did you help him train, too ? - Jared practiced yoga.
He didn't need martial arts in order to
help facilitate the virtuous cycle of business
that I've tried to install here.
In fact, I was set to name him as my successor.
Well, I guess you're going to have to restart your search.
It's an insult to point the spout at your guest.
Someone set the fire on purpose ?
I mean, who would do that to James ?
There's no one you can think of who might have had access to the apartment ?
He had friends.
Maybe I let him out of my sight too often,
but he always told me, "I'm a city kid, Mom."
Ready ?
That's what's left ?
I want him back !
Let's go.
I want James !
Paul Martin is sticking to his open door story.
Did you find anything in Greg Thompson's apartment ?
How about a CODIS hit off the blood matching back to an APW employee ?
Paul Martin ?
Lisa Kay.
She was next in line for promotion if something
were to happen to Greg Thompson or Jared Stanton.
She worked directly underneath them.
Especially Greg Thompson.
We pulled her hair off of his bed.
How does someone like Lisa Kay end up in the DNA database ?
She was convicted for assault four years ago.
Assault with a deadly weapon.
What'd she use ?
I guess that's what they mean when they say corporate warriors.
That's our girl.
Lisa Kay ?
We need to talk.
Do I think I could have done a better job than Jared and Greg combined ?
You bet.
Well, Paul Martin didn't feel the same way.
I mean, after your assault conviction,
he passed you over for both CFO and COO.
He ever give you a reason why he chose Jared and Greg over you ?
If you're waiting for me to bust out the gender bias card, don't bother.
Paul had no problems with me being a woman.
Well, how'd he feel about you being a felon ?
I don't consider what happened a crime.
A guy hit on me all night.
Then he followed me out.
So I asked him which letter he didn't understand,
"N" or "O."
You would have been the first one to shake my hand if you were there.
Oh, well, don't pull out that gender bias card now.
Ever since I started to train here,
I feel stronger and safer.
There's no crime in that.
There was one in Greg Thompson's apartment.
Where we found your hair and your blood.
I'm sure I'm all over his place.
Greg was a great training partner.
A great training partner who got promoted over you.
Yeah, I'm Tom Nikkos.
Can you help me understand how your chess set ended up in James Walker's room ?
I checked with your school. You skipped three classes yesterday,
right around the time someone set James' apartment on fire.
I just went there to play him again.
After losing in the school tournament for the first time in a couple years ?
Looks like you had a pretty good run there.
A ten-year-old beat me in 15 moves.
I had to have a rematch.
We played for the set.
It's an expensive one.
Do you have any idea how long I've been playing,
how hard I've studied ? And then I lose twice to some kid
who doesn't know the difference between a King's Gambit and a Sicilian Defense ?
That kid is dead.
And that's what happens to people
who don't know the difference between being well-trained and being gifted.
Ready ?
That's what's left ?
Try your knight here.
Dr. Hawkes.
Doctor,
I'm...
I'm sorry. What kind of a doctor investigates fires ?
I just moved over from the medical examiner's office.
So you're new.
Are you telling me that NYPD is treating this like a training session ?
I've worked hundreds of cases.
- James was like a son to me. - Mr. Robertson.
Look, it's not your fault.
You'll know as soon as we know something definitive.
The fiber you found from the katana sword, Mac;
fiber I pulled from Greg Thompson's overcoat. They match.
Where in the overcoat did you find the fiber ?
From a one-inch slice inside the lining, waist-high.
The last two calls on Greg Thompson's cell phone went to Jared Stanton.
All right, we know why Jared was in the park.
Greg lured him there.
Icing on the cake :
found bark from the tree at the scene of the crime on the seat of his overcoat.
That explains why Jared Stanton never moved. He didn't know Greg was already there.
The head never came off.
One cut, one kill...
matching the angle of the cut on Jared Stanton's neck, moving from low to high.
Bingo.
We know Greg Thompson killed Jared Stanton.
Great.
We've got our murderer.
Now we just have to prove who murdered him.
Got something for you.
Want to know who was online with James Walker when he died ?
Luke Robertson's daughter, Nina.
That her laptop ?
Already in evidence.
Like I said, kids find trouble when they're not even looking for it.
We've exhausted all the evidence at Greg Thompson's apartment.
What about the pool hall ?
I pulled prints off the murder weapon, but there was no match in AFIS.
Collect any blood ?
It was all cleaned up by the time we got there.
Greg Thompson was skilled enough to decapitate Jared Stanton.
Right, and whoever killed Greg Thompson had to be equally as skilled.
So we've narrowed down our suspects to a handful of APW executives.
Paul Martin, Lisa Kay...
people obsessed with control, perfection.
People who operate at a level above the rest of the world.
What's that ?
It's a tread impression we pulled off the ceiling at the pool hall..
according to an unreliable witness.
Someone who operates at a level above.
Control your breath, then you control your pain.
You've been using every ounce of concentration you have,
to control the pain you're in.
A black belt like Greg Thompson is capable of delivering 2,000 pounds of pressure
with a precise kick.
Pain resides in the mind of the beholder.
Then let's move on to something less subjective.
You murdered Greg Thompson with a fragment from this pool cue.
Those are your prints on the cue...
... and that's your shoe on the ceiling.
I found trace from the paint in your office.
After you stabbed Greg, he stumbled out into the San Gennaro festival.
He wouldn't have known there was a wood splinter in his heart.
He was just looking for anything to hold on to.
That wasn't why I went to see Greg.
You took what I taught you and you killed Jared.
Over what ?
A promotion ?
Greg generated a fake memo.
Put it on a flash drive in Jared's pocket,
pointing us to you.
He just didn't guess that you were going to get to him first.
Do you know the two cycles of business ?
There's the kind I've spent my life fostering..
the virtuous cycle,
and there's the kind Greg Thompson fell into,
the vicious cycle.
It's a choice we all make every day we walk into work.
And what choice did you make when Greg attacked you ?
The one choice left,
I defended myself.
I think a jury will understand that.
They'll look at me,
and my record...
and think...
"Those who live by the sword, die by the sword."
Good game.
I got next.
Yeah, you got it.
So you're telling me you know what happened ?
I know it wasn't Karen Walker's fault.
- I left him home. - It's not your fault.
And I know it wasn't mine, either.
Mr. Robertson.
Look, it's not your fault.
You've been saying it all along, haven't you ?
You know the best thing about being new ?
You're thorough, because you want to study every angle.
Like the way you're trying to sacrifice your bishop for position.
If you'd studied James more, you'd have known how quietly he played.
You didn't hear James in his room when you set the fire in the apartment, did you ?
You used a potato chip bag.
If you hadn't eaten a few chips, I wouldn't be here right now.
But it makes you nervous doing something for the first time, doesn't it ?
Me, I can't eat when I'm anxious.
Some people can't help themselves.
I found the same potato chip trace on your daughter's computer.
Nina was online with James when you got back to your apartment.
What are you doing ?
Playing chess with James.
He's home. He's sick.
James is home ?
I pulled male DNA from the epithelials mixed with the oil on Nina's laptop.
I also found blood trace from a female on the side of the computer.
It has shared alleles at every locus with the male sample.
Daddy !
I'm sorry. Come on.
You tried to get back to the apartment...
but you were too late.
You know what zugzwang means ?
A player is put at a disadvantage because he has to move,
but any move he makes costs him the game.
You're there, Mr. Robertson.
The presence of that DNA in the same oil I found at the scene...
got me this warrant.
Now maybe there's going to come a day in my career, when I won't bother to be here.
When I'll already be searching through your personal belongings
for the tool you used to screw the socket back in place.
But I know, if you step up
before I serve this,
it's going to make a difference.
Why are you telling me this ?
There's not one piece of evidence that says you wanted to hurt James in any way.
I kept asking Karen,
"Move in with me...
we're a family."
She wasn't sure.
So,
I thought if she can't stay in her apartment...
It was supposed to be a little electrical fire.
It's your move.