A Life Cut Short
"Nick and Sara you have a 419 on Simmons Avenue." Catherine Willows, the supervisor for the grave shift CSI team said.
"Another 419 in that area, that is the third one this month." Sara said.
"Yeah it's a rough area." Catherine said.
"Where's Ray and Greg again?" Nick asked.
"Greg is on vacation and Ray called in sick." Catherine said.
Nick nodded.
"What case are you working on tonight?" Sara asked her boss.
"Well unfortunately I get to spend my night working on paperwork, so unless we get another assignment if you need me I'll be in my office." She replied.
"What do you know about our case so far?" Nick asked.
"Not much, just that it's a 419 and the victim is a female." Catherine replied looking at the sheet in her hands.
She handed it to Nick and said "Good luck" as she walked out of the conference room and down the hall to her office.
Sara looked at Nick "want me to drive?" She asked.
"Let's roll" Nick answered and the two of them headed to their crime scene.
When they arrived there were officers waiting for them, they had an area taped off.
"What have we got?" Nick asked one of the officers.
"It isn't good." One of the officers replied, nodding his head toward some bushes.
Nick and Sara exchanged glances. They walked up to the bushes and lying in the bushes they saw the body of a very young child. Nick estimated the child was about 5 years old. The little girl was lifeless but if you didn't know better you would think she was sleeping. She was dressed in ratty, torn clothing and her left shoe had a hole in it. Her hair looked as if it hadn't been combed in a month, although that could be because of being in the bushes. Despite all of that the two CSI'S noticed how adorable the child was. She had fair skin with light, short blonde hair. They saw no visible signs of trauma at least not the front of her but they couldn't move her until a coroner arrived.
"Oh man this is awful." Nick said looking at Sara.
"Yeah in our line of work you never want to see a child." She replied regretfully.
The coroner David Phillips arrived. "Sorry I'm late guys." He said.
"No problem Super Dave." Nick said greeting his colleague. David took the little girls' liver temperature.
"Based on her liver temp I would say she has been dead less than 24 hours." He said.
"Help me roll her David." Nick said.
He did and Nick didn't see any evidence of trauma on the back of her body either.
"Sara, go see if you can find out who called it in, I'll stay here and examine her body some more as well as the area surrounding the body." Nick told her.
"You got it." Sara said.
She walked off to go talk to the officers.
Nick found a hair on the child's shirt, he knew right away it didn't belong to the little girl, the hair was way to long. It was however the same color as their tiny victim. He snapped a couple of pictures and then got out his tweezers, grabbed the hair and put it in a bag marked evidence. He also found a fiber he couldn't identify on the corner of the little girl's lips. He repeated the process of taking pictures and then bagging the evidence for transfer back to the lab. The body was transported to the lab for autopsy but Nick decided to stay at the scene a little longer to see if he could find anything else that would be useful.
Sara walked back over to him.
"Did you find anything out?" He asked her.
"Yeah, those two ladies called it in." She said nodding towards two women.
Nick glanced at the women "hookers?" He asked noticing their skimpy clothing.
"Yeah and I talked to them, they say they had nothing to do with the little's girls' death, they claimed they did the right thing by calling us, but that is all they will admit too."
Then she asked. "Did you find anything?"
"Yeah I found a hair on our victim's shirt that doesn't belong to her as well as a fiber of some kind on her corner of her lips." Nick replied.
The CSI'S stayed at the scene a little while longer looking for more evidence but didn't find anything else that could help them so they headed back to the lab.
Once they got back to the lab Sara decided to search through the missing children's database, she hoped that would help identify the little girl.
Nick dropped off the hair to Mandy in DNA, the fiber to Hodges in the trace lab and then headed to the morgue to see what Doc Robbins could tell him. By the time Nick got to the morgue Doc Robbins had already completed the autopsy.
"Hey Doc, what can you tell me?" Nick asked walking in.
"Hey Nick, I have a COD for you." He replied.
"Yeah, that's good, what is it?" Nick asked.
"Suffocation." Doc Robbins replied.
"That makes some sense because I had found a fiber I couldn't identify on her lips, maybe it's from a blanket or pillow of some kind that was used to suffocate her." Nick said.
"Maybe." Doc Robbins agreed.
"Was there any evidence of sexual abuse?" Nick asked.
"No. I hope that makes you feel a little better" He replied.
"It doesn't, but thanks for trying. This little girl was left in bushes like she was trash, nothing would make me feel better except finding the monster responsible for this" Nick said. Then added "What else can you tell me?"
"I took some of her blood and sent it to TOX to see if there are any drugs in her system." Doc Robbins said.
"Thanks Doc, do you have anything else for me?" Nick asked.
"No, I'm sorry, I don't." Doc Robbins said shaking his head sadly.
"That's alright, you were a big help." Nick assured him as he left the morgue.
Nick then wandered down the hall to find Sara. He found her still slumped over a computer pouring over a missing children's database.
"Hey Sara." He greeted.
"Hey Nick, was Doc Robbins any help?" She asked. "Yeah, her COD is suffocation and there were no signs of sexual abuse. He sent some of her blood to TOX." Nick said, filling her in on what he had learned.
"Are you having any luck?" He asked.
"No" Sara said glumly.
"That's horrible, nobody even reported this poor little girl missing." Nick said shaking his head sadly.
"Yes it is, what kind of a parent doesn't even report their child missing?" Sara said growing angry.
"One with secrets." Nick replied.