Last on CSI: "Werewolves"

In a darkened phone booth, a mysterious hooded person calls the LVPD whispering a request that the police come "pick up the body." Captain Brass arrives with a back-up team at the address given, a lonely house with no visible neighbors. The body of the owner, Hayden Bradford, is found inside, killed by a single gunshot to the chest. The M.E., David Phillips, has his hands full because Hayden is one hairy man--werewolf hairy. Grissom and the CSI team are even taken aback as evidence of the victim's propensity to shed is found everywhere. The liver temp on the victim is eighty degrees, indicating he's been dead about 12 hours. A cell phone vibrates inside the man's pant pocket. Warrick retrieves it, noting the caller is "Michelle." This is her sixth attempt to reach Hayden since 4:53 pm. Grissom follows the body back to autopsy. Catherine and Nick process the outside of the house, while Sara and Warrick take the interior.

There isn't a single feminine touch to Hayden's house, although Warrick finds a Christmas photo of the victim with "Michelle," a sweet young blonde. On the computer printer they find a threatening letter: "Hey, Jackass, this is your last chance. Pay your debt or I'll hunt you down." The sender has an e-mail name of Casino-Dan. They now have a possible motive for the homicide and bag the computer for lab analysis. Outside, Nick and Catherine find a broken window and signs of forced entry. She takes trace samples of glass and pebbles beneath the window, while Nick dusts and gets a print on a fist size rock used to smash it. In the backyard they note a slight rise in the ground outside the bedroom wall. Digging down, they uncover a .32 Beretta. The victim was shot, but who buries a murder weapon at the crime scene? It's bagged for Ballistics.
In the Coroner's Office Washroom, Grissom and Dr. Robbins marvel at the extent of the victim's body hair. It's caused by a rare genetic disorder called HYPERTRICHOSIS. In some individuals, the hair grows everywhere except the eyes and mouth. Dr. Robbins recounts a story of a Mexican family with thirty members afflicted. Two teen boys were sold to the National Circus, another sad case of one's physical deformities being used as family entertainment. The bullet is withdrawn from the body and sent to Ballistics. Meanwhile, Archie Johnson and Greg huddle in the A/V Lab and analyze the ISP provider route for "Casino-Dan." The server is in Argentina, but the sender of the threatening e-mail has a Nevada business license and address. Another interesting thing of note: Hayden Bradford recently opened an account with Peopledetectors.com. It will take Archie some time to triage the computer's hard drive to other e-mails, but maybe he can find out who the victim was looking for?

Warrick and Greg visit Dan Nobler (30), aka "Casino-Dan." Yes, he sent the threatening e-mail to Hayden because the man ran up $10,000 in online gambling debts, and then cancelled his credit card. Dan got burned and tried to shake him down, but he denies killing him. They can contact his lawyer if they have any further questions. Warrick watches Dan wipe his shoes on a coarse welcome mat before entering his house. The debris from his shoes appears to match the pebbles at the crime scene. They take a sample. In Ballistics, Bobby Dawson fires the .32 Beretta into a collector filled with rubber balls. The impacted bullet is studied under the comparison microscope with the fatal bullet extracted from the victim. No match. The buried gun was not used to kill Hayden Bradford. Some positive news: the print lifted off the rock used to break the window at the victim's house belongs to a Brent Moyer, arrested in 1999 for a misdemeanor. He's brought in and tells Nick that Hayden is a close friend. He's shocked by the news of his murder. As for the broken window, he explains that he was tossing a baseball with Hayden last week, that the ball broke the window. Dangerous shards were hanging from the windowpane, so he used the rock to clear them away. Yes, he knew Hayden was a very hairy guy. In fact, he was dating his sister, Michelle. Then Dan realizes she hasn't been told yet. She's called six times from their parents' house in Pahrump. Her cell's probably out of reach. He asks permission to inform Michele of Hayden's death, knowing she'll be devastated by the news. Meanwhile, on the outskirts, Detective Sofia Curtis meets up with Sara at the phone booth used to make the call to the LVPD. Hair similar in texture to the victim is found on the floor of the booth. However, Hayden was killed twelve hours before the call was made. Strange…
Wendy Simms analyzes the hair in the DNA Lab and declares that it doesn't belong to Hayden Bradford. The chromosomes are XX, female, with seven alleles in common--as in brother and sister. Later, an analysis of the hair samples taken at the crime scene shows some matches to the hair sample taken at the phone booth, meaning the sister is not only the anonymous caller (and a hairy girl at that), but a suspect. Sara tracks down the birth certificate and learns that Hayden had a twin sister, Allison, born to a Rita Bradford in Fresno, California. There is no trace of Allison since that time, not even a death certificate. If she's alive, she's managed to live completely off the grid. They go back to the crime scene to look for evidence of Hayden's sister, and Catherine finds a peephole in a wall shielding a secret room. As she presses to gain entry, a small, frightened voice belonging to Allison Bradford pleads for her to "go away." Catherine assures the girl by stating that she is a scientist, not a voyeur. She knows that she suffers from hypertrichosis, but that is not why she wants her to come out of hiding. She needs to talk to her about her brother. Allison, trusting Catherine, steps out into the light. Her face is that of a werewolf, entirely covered in hair with the exception of her eyes and mouth. Catherine has to force herself to stay on task so as not to spook this reclusive, troubled girl. She states that she always stays hidden whenever Hayden has visitors. She heard a gunshot last night, came out of her room, found his body. She didn't want the call traced back to the house, so she waited until midnight, went to the phone booth and called the police. She wants to stay at the house. She has a pathological fear of people seeing her as a freak. She never knew her father, and her mother died when she and Hayden were teenagers.

Upon hearing of Catherine's encounter with Allison, he confers with Nick about the decedent's hiring of a company called Peopledetectors.com to track down the mother. Even though the daughter believes mom is dead, Mrs. Bradford is alive and well and living in Henderson, Nevada. Grissom has her brought in and hears her painful story. After a 27-hour labor, her twins were born. A few weeks later her husband walked out, not willing to be labeled a father of two freaks of nature. Friends and family stopped visiting. Hayden didn't have facial hair like Allison. She was teased by kids at nursery school, so Mrs. Bradford moved the family to Las Vegas and kept the girl a secret. When the kids became teens, Allison wanted to go outside. Mom imprisoned her, and realized she couldn't take it any more. She had Hayden tell Allison she had died in a car accident. She thought it would be easier for her to accept her mother's death than her mother's abandonment. It's been seven years since she's seen either child, and now her son is dead. She cannot bring herself to face Allison again.


Hodges anal-retentiveness leads to a potential break in the case. He's compared pebbles from the crime scene to the pebbles taken from Dan Nobler's doormat. They're a pea gravel-window glass combo consistent with each other. That allows Warrick to haul Nobler into Interrogation Room A. Naturally, the online gambling maverick brings his attorney. When faced with the physical evidence, he admits to paying Hayden a visit--again, just to shake him down. But when he saw a werewolf at the broken window, he bolted. Who needs to get into a tussle with a freak of nature? Back to square one…and for Hodges, that means scanning the fatal bullet extracted from Hayden under an SEM. The composition readout shows it to be 92.5 pure silver, molded by hand from sterling silver jewelry. A silver bullet killed the werewolf, and someone went through a lot of trouble to make it--meaning, this was personal.

Michelle Moyer (28) has returned from Pahrump and Catherine questions her. She is devastated over the murder of Hayden. They were engaged. She says she called six times because he wanted her to tape a gold tournament on ESPN, but her parent's VCR was broken. Catherine gets a call to report to the Coroner's Office where Dr. Robbins tells her that David Phillips didn't get a correct LIVIDITY or T.O.D. on Hayden Bradford because of all the body hair. However, once the victim was shaved in autopsy they noticed a blood pool on his left side. He was turned over on a hardwood floor at least several hours postmortem…but blue carpet fibers were found on the body. Allison has blue carpet in her secret room. Was he killed there then moved? Good question. Catherine and Sofia go back to the crime scene and coax Allison out of her room. While Sofia guards her, Catherine processes the room that is like a dollhouse of miniature crafts. With UV goggles on, she works her ALS wand and finds a blood pool under Allison's bed. When pressed, Allison blurts the truth. Hayden burst into her room looking for the .32 Beretta, but Allison hated guns and had buried it a long time ago. Then he got shot in the chest, and she hid behind the door. Catherine notices an older model TV in the room, right in line with the open door. Was the TV on? No, it's broken, hasn't worked in years. If Allison was hiding behind the door, she must have seen the killer's reflection in the screen. She did. It was Brent Moyer, Michelle's brother. Neither Brent nor Michelle knew she existed. Hayden was going to tell Michelle about Allison and promised his sister that his fiancée would accept her, that they'd be a family. She recalls huddling behind the door in the dark, watching as Brent stood over Hayden's body and muttered the word "freak." Why didn't Allison tell Catherine the truth to begin with? She didn't want to be dragged into court, to face the public, become a sideshow.

However, CSI is able to build a case without her. Brent Moyer is arrested at his home. In the kitchen of his sloppy bachelor's pad are bullet making equipment, the remnants of a silver necklace, and silver trace in the mold. They've got their killer. In Interrogation Room A, Brent confesses to the crime. Hayden was going to marry his sister. He couldn't let that happen. Yes, he was a friend, but the man was diseased, and hypertrichosis is hereditary. He wasn't going to have his sister give birth to more freaks. Outside, Michelle is waiting. She knows the truth. Sofia checked the TV listings. There was no gold tournament on ESPN. She called Hayden six times in a desperate attempt to warn him about her brother. He went berserk after she announced her engagement to the family up in Pahrump. Michelle didn't tell the cops before because her brother had threatened her. Now she's safe…safe and heartbroken.

As for Allison, she tries to assure Catherine that she can make it on her own, out of public scrutiny. She can order anything she needs online, and she manages what little money she has carefully. Outside, Mrs. Bradford pulls up, starts to approach the house, then gets seized with fear and doubt. She almost drives away, and then some source of maternal courage finds its way from her heart to her mind, and she turns around, reaches the front door, and knocks, hoping for a second chance.