CHAPTER 2: THE EVIDENCE
While searching for a parking spot at the lab, Sara realized that she, Warrick, and Greg were the first ones back from Goodsprings Valley. She pulls into a space, shifts the vehicle in park, cuts the engine, and exits from the driver's side.
"Thanks again for letting me ride back with you guys," said Greg.
"Anytime," replied Warrick.
"I don't see Catherine's SUV or Grissom's Denali in the parking lot," observed Sara.
Warrick quit unloading their evidence from the back. He took a quick look around the parking lot for himself. "I don't see Brass's squad car for that matter; we must be the first ones back."
"No, here comes Catherine and Nick now," said Greg spotting them pulling into the parking lot. "Am I suppose to go to the impound lot to retrieve the truck?"
Sara turned to Warrick to gauge his reaction as if he knew the answer to Greg's question, which he didn't, so Sara gave Greg advice of her own. "If I were you, I'd just wait until Grissom gets back."
In the meantime, they all head into the lab to get started on analyzing their evidence. Catherine and Nick set up shop in a room while Sara and Warrick worked in another adjacent to theirs. Sara entered the fingerprints collected at the scene into the computer database for comparison. Warrick sprawled out his findings on a table for further examination. Catherine and Nick wait for their photos to develop, and Greg hung around in the break room for either Brass or Grissom to return so he could retrieve the truck from the impound lot.
At first glance, Warrick observed, "Most of this stuff is garbage."
He pulled on a pair of latex gloves to get started on, sorting through the "garbage," separating his findings into three separate piles so he could test each of them. Warrick began with the beer bottles emptying any liquid they might contain into Petri dishes. As for the broken bottles, he gathered up the shards in an attempt to piece them back together so Sara could test them for fingerprints.
"Have either of you seen Grissom?" asked David Hodges.
Warrick and Sara were too engrossed in processing beer bottles and analyzing fingerprints to notice him.
"Guys, hello?" Hodges waved his hands in front of himself in an attempt to gain their attention.
"What do you want?" asked a choleric Warrick; he wasn't fond of Hodges.
"Easy, I just want to help," Hodges replied.
"You can help by analyzing this," said Sara hopping down from the stool. She strolled over to the table of evidence handing Hodges the yellow, empty bottle she found and collected at the scene from the back of the pickup.
Hodges's eyes grew wide with enlightenment as Sara handed it to him, sometimes he felt like she was the only one who cared that he was even a part of this team. He wasn't about to shy away from the opportunity to help work on a case, so Hodges left taking the evidence gladly willing to analyze its contents.
"What'd you that for?" asked Warrick, raising an eyebrow while shooting her a look of question.
"He wants to feel included, and that ought to get him out of our hair," Sara said, grinning.
Warrick's taken aback at the sight of her smile. "Sara Sidle, who knew you had a mischievous side?" he said playfully. "You're bad, but he'll be back, you know that, right?"
After what felt like multiple hours, Catherine and Nick were finally finished developing, printing, and labeling the crime scene photos before laying them out to be put into chronological order.
"Did that take as long as it felt like it did?" asked Nick, unsure whether or not he actually wanted to know the answer.
"Yeah," replied Catherine glancing up at the clock on the wall. "Is that all of them?"
"I think so," replied Nick." Man, this is a lot of photos taken between the two of us."
Sure the photos were time-stamped by the standard-issue camera, but they had to go by Grissom's protocol, which included giving them a once over. Catherine and Nick took a few steps back to admire their handy work reminding themselves they still had to study each photo thoroughly in case either of them may have overlooked anything while on the scene. Nick just finished putting them in order when Catherine started messing it up.
"Hey, what are you doing?" asked Nick.
Catherine began to gather any and all photos she took of the body at the crime scene. "Don't worry. I'm just gonna make copies to send to the coroner's office. Doc Robbins might not have our victim's body, but I wonder if he can tell us from the photos what the cause of death may have been."
"I don't know about you, but I think we deserve a break," Nick comments.
Grissom was the last one to return to the lab from Goodsprings Valley. He parked his Denali in the parking lot, but still wasn't feeling quite right since being in the heat. His head began to throb, which Grissom knew was the onset symptom for migraines. Lately, he'd been prone to them. As Grissom sat in his vehicle, he could feel it begin to affect his other senses: all of a sudden, Grissom became increasingly sensitive to the sunlight reflecting off of the pavement that glared onto the windshield. He decided it best to hop out of the already stuffy vehicle before his symptoms got any worse.
Grissom did so by walking the extra distance from the hallway to the quiet stairwell instead of the main entrance to the noisy elevator dodging the front desk patrons along with the lab technicians upon his way to his office. Making himself more comfortable, Grissom took off his straw sun hat, shed his CSI issued caviler vest, changed out of his cotton white v-neck t-shirt, which was soaked with sweat, and into a short-sleeved, plaid, men's casual button-down shirt. Seating himself in his chair at his desk Grissom leans back, taking off his glasses to rub his temples in order to try to soothe the oncoming migraine. He inhales and exhales deeply, but just as Grissom finds himself able to relax, the phone rings.
"This is Gil Grissom with the Las Vegas Crime Lab."
"Finally!" exclaimed a male voice. "Mr. Grissom, we've been trying to contact you."
"May I ask who this is and how you got this number?"
"This is doctor Scott Thompson Chief Medical Examiner with Spring Valley Medical Center Emergency Room. One of the paramedics gave me your number."
"Ah, right. Wait, the number I gave him was for my cellphone. How did you get this number?"
"I tried calling your cellphone several times without response," the doctor paused between his explanation which Grissom began frantically searching his pants pockets for his cellular phone.
It then dawned on Grissom that it must still be in his vehicle. He flashed back to when he left the scene in Goodsprings Valley. As it turns out, while Grissom was hallucinating, his cellphone slipped out of his pants pocket and onto the floorboard. Even though it was on ring/vibrate, he couldn't hear it over the sound of the traffic and the AC.
"Sir, are you still there?" asked the doctor.
"What? Yes. Sorry please continue," replied Grissom listening intently.
"After that, I contacted the lab where a receptionist patched me through to your line. As for the body, despite our team's best medical efforts, your victim died. In my professional medical opinion, had he sought immediate medical attention sooner, I believe we could have saved his life."
"Thank you, Doctor Thompson. I'll have someone from the lab come to retrieve the body," replied Grissom ending the call. He then dialed the number for the coroner's office to inform Doc Robbins to tell David he could pick up the body from the hospital.
Greg is joined by Catherine and Nick in the break room. Nick took a seat next to Greg while Catherine sat across from them.
"Have you just been waiting there the whole time?" asked Catherine to Greg.
Greg's been waiting so long that he was munching on a snack-size bag of goldfish crackers. He finished chewing before replying. "Yeah, I've been keeping an eye out for Grissom but haven't seen him yet. He told me to pick up the truck from the impound, but I can't do that without the necessary paperwork filled out by Brass, who I haven't seen yet either. So are you guy's having any luck?"
"Nope," replied Nick adding, "Not really."
Sara's eyes began to burn from having stared at the computer screen so long while waiting for it to make a match. "That's it," she said, hopping down from the stool. "I'm going across the hall to see if the others are having better luck than us."
Sara popped her head in the room where Catherine and Nick should be, but all she saw were the crime scene photos sprawled out on the table. Where are those guys? She thought. Curiosity caught the better of her, as Sara couldn't help herself from making comparisons of the photos.
After being gone longer than anticipated, Warrick went in search of Sara. "There you are. C'mere I've got something that I want you to see."
"What is it?" she asked.
"Warrick led Sara back across the hall to their workroom.
"I was sorting through the receipts that I found in the front of the truck. Most of them are barely legible 'cause this guy just crumpled them up, I thought, why keep them? Why not throw them away? But now I'm glad that he didn't. Here," said Warrick handing a crumpled receipt to Sara, "See for yourself."
Sara smoothed out the receipt as best she could with most of the ink has faded, but she could make out one thing. "It looks like it says Larry's Liquor," she said, reading it aloud.
"It does," confirmed Warrick. "Larry's Liquor & General Store to be exact. That's the name of the story Larry Waters owns."
"Okay, so it's proof of purchase," said Sara.
"Yeah, but in Larry's statement, he said Miles and Matt stole the beer. If that's true, why would they have a receipt?" asked Warrick.
"That's a good question," she replied.
"So this is where you guys went," said Sara entering the break room with Warrick following behind her.
"Please tell me you guys are having better luck at this investigation than we are," comments Catherine.
"I wish," replied Sara. "My eyes burn from staring at a computer screen."
"I'd take that over sorting through hundreds of photos," said Nick.
"What are you complaining about?" comments Warrick. "I'm basically sorting through garbage."
"At least you guys are doing something," said Greg, "I'm just waiting around..." he spots Grissom walking by the break room, stopping himself from what he was about to say.
Grissom turned on his heels at the sight of his team chatting instead of doing the jobs he assigned them. "Greg, why aren't you at the impound lot retrieving the truck?"
"I... Sara told me to wait until you go back from the crime scene," explained Greg.
Grissom looked in Sara's direction, who knew she was in the wrong for advising against her supervisor's instructions. He turned his sights back on Greg, whom Grissom could tell felts beside himself for not knowing what to do. "It's all right, Greg. I'm glad I've got you all here; this way, I don't have to repeat myself." Before Grissom said what he had to say next, he seated himself at the head of the table. "I just got off the phone with the hospital, who informed them that our hit-and-run victim didn't make it. I was on my way to speak with Brass when I caught you all in here."
"Brass is here too?" said Warrick. "I didn't see his car in the parking lot."
"He's parked in back, but that's beside the point," replied Grissom.
Brass enters the break room. As it turns out, much like Grissom, Brass had been in his office all along. He's been filling out paperwork, including the forums Greg would need to retrieve the truck from the impound lot along with two separate search warrants, one for the pickup truck; and another for the securing footage of Larry Waters convenience store.
Brass intrudes on the team conversation. "Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt, but here's the paperwork," Brass said, handing off one set to Greg and another set to Nick.
Greg got up from where he was sitting, attempting to leave the awkward conversation, but Grissom told him to stay put a while longer. "Ah-ah, sit back down," he exclaimed. "None's leaving until we settle this. Now, let's go over what we've learned so far, starting with Warrick."
Everyone at the table turns their attention to Warrick. "I found a receipt from Larry's Liquor & General Store," said Warrick. "Proof that the beer was purchased, not stolen."
"This means Larry's statement doesn't add up with the evidence," says Catherine.
"Exactly," comments Grissom.
"At the scene, Larry mentioned Miles was the name of our dead guy's buddy," chimed Brass.
"Where are you going with this?" asked Greg.
"This means we still have an investigation," replied Grissom. "We still have a crime scene to find and process and killer to bring to justice. So here's what I want everyone to do. Greg, I want you to retrieve the truck from the impound lot. There may be traces of other evidence we didn't know to look for. Sara, you're with Greg. Brass, I want you to track down Miles Gardner and bring him in for questioning. Right now, he's our primary suspect in this case. Nick and Warrick, I want you to go back to Goodsprings Valley to obtain the security footage from Larry Waters' convenience store. It may be the last footage of our victim alive. Catherine, I want you to go to the Goodsprings Valley police department."
"What, what for?" Catherine asked.
"Larry claims that he's made complaint calls to them before reporting people stealing from his store; I want to know if there's any truth to it or not," replied her supervisor.
Everyone got up from the table exiting the break room and went on about doing their assigned duties. Catherine, Nick, and Warrick all head back out to Goodsprings Valley ⏤ in separate vehicles ⏤ they were about to end up like Greg.
Catherine pulled up to the local sheriff's station heading inside, turning heads as she did so. Geez, these guys act as they've never seen a woman before, she thought to herself. Of course, this didn't bug her any, having been an exotic dancer before becoming a CSI investigator. Catherine was used to dealing with guys reacting to her that way. She tried not to pay them any mind until Catherine felt a guy grope her butt upon entering the station.
"HEY!" she said, flinching as he copped a feel, but the guy walked out the door past her before she could do anything about it.
"DAMN IT, Frank!" yelled a male voice as the sheriff stepped out of from the back office. "Sorry about that, ma'am. Frank's just one of many local guys who loves to raise hell with the ladies. If it any consolation, he's why we keep our secretary Margery behind the desk."
Catherine glanced over at the much older woman realizing Frank was one of those guys who'd chase after any woman that walked. Margery looked like she was in her late sixties, dressed in a long-sleeved yellow women's button-down sweater, paired with a wool skirt, nylons, and brown ladies loafers with thick glasses.
"Right... I'm Catherine Willows, CSI Level 3 Assistant Supervisor with the Las Vegas Crime Lab," she said, holding out her ID badge for him to see, so he extended a hand for her to shake in return.
The Sheriff looked her up and down. "I didn't think you looked like law enforcement. Nice to meet you, Catherine. I'm Sheriff Talbert, but you can call me Richard. Let's talk inside my office."
They walked back to his office, where he pulls a chair up from against the wall for Catherine to sit in before seating himself behind his desk. Sheriff Talbert leans back in his chair, clasping his hands behind his head as he does so, and props his feet up on the desk. It's unprofessional as all get out by Catherin's standards, but she figured the guy was in the comfort of his own office, so who was she to judge?
"What can I do you for?" asked Sheriff Talbert.
"Do you know a Larry Waters?"
"Yes. Yes, I do. The convenience store owner," the sheriff replies, shifting in his seat, taking his feet off the desktop, dropping his hands from behind his head, and sits upright. "Is this about his reports of theft?"
"Well, yeah, how did you know?"
"He's always making 9-1-1 distress calls to the station claiming that someone's stealing from his store," explained the sheriff.
"Always?" wondered Catherine.
Sheriff Talbert got up from behind his desk to head over to a filing cabinet. He thumbed through several manila-colored file folders before coming across the one he was looking for. He found the one with the phone records of Larry's 9-1-1 calls handing them off to Catherine.
"Here," said the sheriff, sitting back down. "See for yourself, although if you ask me, the guy is just paranoid."
Catherine flipped through the folder of phone records glancing briefly at them. "It shows here that he made calls to the station every day for the past two weeks. Did you ever respond to any of his calls?"
"Yeah, of course, we did. That's our job, but eventually, it felt more like the boy who cried wolf, so finally, I stopped sending my guys out there and just went there myself to settle matters." The Sheriff chuckles to himself before continuing. "I told Larry that unless they've vandalizing the place, the police department can't be responsible for every stolen six-pack. After all, we've got bigger issues than kids stealing beer."
"Of course you do," said Catherine under her breath. "Uh, do you mind if I keep these?"
"Sure, take 'em, it's yours, won't do me any good. As far as I'm concerned, it's just taking up space," replied Sheriff Talbert.
Deciding that there was nothing more local law enforcement could do to help, Sheriff Talbert escorts Catherine out of the station to the parking lot and back to her vehicle.
"Thanks, Sheriff!" she called before backing out to pull away. He simply stood there waving to her before heading back into the station.
Nick and Warrick made it to Larry's convenience store setting off the chime that alerts you when customers enter through the door. As they walk by the aisles, Nick points out the security cameras mounted on the opposing walls to Warrick, who wonders if they are operable or just for show. The pair makes their way to the storefront counter, which Larry's standing behind the cash register.
"Hello, gentlemen, welcome to my establishment. Let me know if..." Larry quit greeting them as soon as he realized who they were.
"Hello, I'm Nick Stokes, and this is Warrick Brown; we're CSI's with the Las Vegas Crime Lab here in regards to your claims of someone stealing from your store."
Nick and Warrick flashed their ID badges at Larry, who seemed the least bit interested until he heard the reason behind why they were there. "You're going to have to be more specific," said Larry. "People steal from my store more often than you think. In fact, it's why I recently installed my security cameras."
"So they do work?" asked Warrick.
"Yes, my son's the one who installed them," replied Larry.
"In your statement taken by officer Sanchez you mentioned a Matt Whitman and his buddy Miles stole beer," said Nick.
"They did, and I'll tell you what I told that other guy at the scene; I've got the footage to prove it!" replied Larry.
"That's why we're here," explained Warrick, "to retrieve the footage of them stealing," he said, taking out the warrant to show Larry.
Larry pushes his bottle-capped glasses up the bridge of his nose so he could see the paper better. He then shifts his weight on his feet as if to weigh his options for what he should do next. "This way, the monitors are in the back," said Larry.
He leads them to a back office with two security monitors where the security footage is stored. The convenience store owner seats himself in an office chair, rolling over to a shelf where the tapes are neatly labeled and stacked in chronological order.
"I'll be right back, don't touch anything," instructed Larry leaving the room to get something.
"Look at this," said Nick to Warrick about the monitors. "The first camera is positioned just above the entrance of the store, and the second is positioned on that back wall."
"Yeah, that's not a lot of coverage. I mean, you can't even see down that hall to the back exit or the restrooms," comments Warrick.
They watched Larry through the security monitors that showed he went back through the store to a stock room to get a box for them to carry the tapes in. He returned placing the box in the office chair then grabbed several tapes off of the shelf placing them in the box. Larry picked the box up from the chair before handing it over to Nick, who was closest to him.
"Here, now I don't have copies of these tapes, so I would like these back when you're done," said Larry.
"Sir, you're not getting these back; they're evidence in an investigation," explained Warrick as he and Nick turned to leave.
"Well, you can't do that!" snapped Larry, trying to retrieve the box of tapes back from Nick.
"Yes, we can; that's what the warrant allows us to do," said Nick trying not to drop the box while fending off Larry.
Warrick managed to pull Larry away from Nick, who didn't go without a struggle but finally calmed down and quit resisting. Larry straightened himself up before allowing them to leave, deciding it was best to just cooperate. However, he didn't let them leave without some parting words.
"I hope you find the other guy that stole from me," called Larry.
Nick was already out the door setting off the chime as he did so to load the box up in the SUV, but Warrick stopped in his tracks with one hand on the door. Larry continued speaking, knowing he at least caught the attention of Warrick.
"What goes around comes around, and his buddy got what was coming to him," Larry retorted in regards to Matt Whitman.
Warrick felt anger rise in him much as it did in Grissom when he verbally quarreled with Larry at the crime scene. His hand began to clench into a fist as he debated punching Larry, but Warrick fought the urge to. Instead, he shot the convenience store owner a glaring look over his shoulder before heading on his way out the door. Warrick climbed into the passenger seat, his colleague taking notice of his change of attitude.
"Hey, man, are you all right?" questioned Nick.
"Yeah, I'm fine just drive," replied Warrick.
Nick pulled out of the parking lot of the convenience store to head back to the lab.
Sara and Greg arrived at the impound lot, where they remained idle, waiting for the gate to be opened. She pressed the call button on the speaker box but got no response.
"Maybe you have to push the gate open?" suggested Greg.
Sara chuckled a little to herself. "The gates are automatic and operated by the guard." She glanced in the direction of the security camera that oversaw the gate waving, hoping that would alert the guard to give them clearance.
"Clearly, friendly waving to a camera isn't working either," remarked Greg. "Got any other ideas?"
"I could try honking," suggested Sara pressing the horn of the SUV twice before a guard met them at the gate.
"Sorry about that!" said the guard who operated the gate manually from the inside, allowing them through. "It wasn't that I couldn't hear you; it's just that the talk button for the speaker box quit working yesterday, and the button for the automatic gate hasn't worked in weeks, but we've got a guy scheduled to come out here to get those things fixed soon."
Sara pulled up to the guard station rolling her window down as she did so to state their business. "Hi, I'm Sara Sidle, and this is Greg Sanders." The guard leaned in to look at Greg, who smiled and waved. "We're CSI's from the Las Vegas Crime Lab here to retrieve a red 2004 Toyota Tundra with Texas plates."
"Texas plates, huh? Lemme check our lot inventory," said the guard as he headed back to his little station. He returned shortly after, "Can I see some ID?" He requested.
"Yeah, sure," replied Sara as she and Greg presented their ID badges to him.
The guard collected their badges from them to further examine. Satisfied with the authenticity of their identification badges, he directs them to the pickup. "It's parked on the south end of the lot."
"Thank you, sir," said Sara pulling away.
They found the truck parked between a gray Sedan and a blue minivan. After paying the fine to retrieve the truck from the impound lot, they called in one of their tow trucks to bring Miles's pickup back to the garage at the lab. Once there, Sara and Greg both suited up in jumpsuits, latex gloves, goggles, and got to work on re-examining the inside.
"Wait, I almost forgot," said Sara grabbing two medical masks handing one to Greg. She remembered from last time that the inside reeked like cigarette smoke.
"What's this for?" Greg wondered.
"Trust me. You'll want it," Sara replied, smiling at him as she put hers on over her ears.
Greg opened the front driver side door of the truck, immediately understanding what she meant as the foul odor hit him. "Geez! I can smell it even through the mask," he said, coughing slightly.
"You all right?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine; let's just do this quickly."
"Greg, you know what Grissom always says."
"What?"
"Do you want this done quick, or do you want it done right?"
"Okay, but can we do something about the smell?" complained Greg.
Sara went to get some box fans to try to circulate the smell from the inside of the truck.
"Thank you," said Greg.
Sara decided she would re-examine the back of the inside of the truck while Greg re-examined the front. He assisted her in, and as Sara scoots to the center of the backbench seat, she noticed small traces of a red substance on the floor.
"Hey, Greg, could you hand me a flashlight, please?"
"Yeah, sure," he said, handing one to her. "What is it?"
"I don't know why I didn't see this before," she comments, leaning down for a closer look. "It looks like it might be blood."
"How do we test for blood?" asked Greg, who was still new to the field.
Sara got up from all fours. "You mean you don't know?" she asked, smiling at him before making a request. "Go to my kit and get the bottle marked 'luminal' and a cotton swab."
"Here you go," he said, handing her the bottle and single swab. "Are you going to tell me what this stuff is?"
Her excitement was as plain as the smile on Sara's face knowing that she got the chance to teach her colleague something about forensic science. "Luminal," she began holding up the bottle like Vanna White for him to see, "is a chemical solution that detects trace amounts of blood as it reacts with the iron in hemoglobin." She paused during her explanation to make sure Greg was following what she said so far. "The cotton swab is what we use to test it with." She handed him the bottle of luminal as well as the cotton swab encouraging him to learn. "Here, you try. Just pour some onto the swab to test the stain."
Greg did as she instructed. "How do we know if its blood?" he asked.
"The cotton swab will turn a sort of deep pink color," she replied.
He swabbed the stain, but the luminal dipped tip of the cotton swab didn't react. "I don't think I did it right."
"Well, did it turn?" asked Sara as Greg handed her the swab so she could see for herself. "Nope, that means it's not blood."
"What is it then?" Greg wondered.
Sara scratches at the stain on the floor with her index finger, bringing it to her nose to smell when a voice from behind startled both her and Greg.
"It's cherry syrup from a Big Gulp," said the voice.
Sara and Greg whirled around to see Warrick standing in the doorway of the garage.
"How did you know that?" asked Greg.
"Because I found a styrofoam cup with red stuff in it, tested the contents, and that's what the test results showed," replied Warrick.
"There you are," said Nick. "Warrick, are you going to help with these boxes of tapes or not?"
Brass managed to track down Miles Gardner while responding as backup to reports of stealing from a local convenience store in Vegas. As he pulled into the parking lot, Brass spotted Miles handcuffed, sitting on the edge of the curb outside the storefront while the storeowner gave his statement to Sanchez.
"Thank God you're here!" exclaimed the owner of the convenience store. "This thief," he said, looking in Miles's direction, "was stealing from my store. He tried to pay me with casino chips."
"What a coincidence," said Brass to Miles, "You're just the guy I was looking for," he said, squatting down next to him, taking off his sunglasses as he did so. "Wait, you are Miles Gardner?"
"Yeah, who are you?"
"I'm Captain James Brass with the Las Vegas Police Department. You're coming downtown to the station with me for questioning."
"All because I stole some beer!" said Miles.
"No," replied Brass smiling smuggled at Miles adding, "because you killed your best friend."
"Naw, man, I didn't kill nobody! Hey, wait!"
Brass got up off his haunches grabbing Miles by the arm pulling him up to a standing position. He escorted him to the back of his squad car while reading him his Miranda Rights.
"You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law..."
