Conviction – Black Orchid

By: Marie Thong

“Conviction” mixes things up a little bit this week with the CIU team thrown into an active investigation involving the serial killer named Black Orchid Killer or B.O.K. The episode starts with a series of shots showing the deaths of three of the B.O.K.’s victims in 2006 – each brutally bashed before leaving plaster lipstick across their lips – Black Orchid #4, hence how he got the name.

Hayes (Hayley Atwell) awakens from her slumber to notifications erupting from her phone, asking whether it’s her new beau’s phone she rolls over to find the bed empty. Checking her phone now, she sees the notifications are messages from Wallace (Eddie Cahill) wanting her to meet him at a crime-scene. A woman, Marla Higgins, was found bludgeoned to death – why does this spark an interest for the CIU team? Marla had dark hair and blue eyes and a smearing of Black Orchid #4 across her lips – meaning either there’s a BOK copycat or Detective Cestero (Berto Colon) put away the wrong man all those years ago.

At CIU we find Tess (Emily Kinney) has put together quite the workup for her team having plastered the whiteboard with photos and evidence, some of which her “personal research” – her fascination for serial killers stuns her colleagues having seemed so mild-mannered and timid in the past. Her fascination stems from the murder of her aunt, wanting to understand “how people could do such terrible things.” Hello, resident expert of the episode.

Tess has always had her doubts about Clark Sims’ (Patrick Breen) – the man convicted for the B.O.K. murders. Sims has always pleaded innocence, which according to Tess is strange as serial killers always want credit for their crimes. However, despite this, Sam (Shawn Ashmore) is still indignant noting, “Sims fits the FBI profile to a T” (Classic Sam, how many times does he have to be wrong about someone before he just shuts his mouth…just saying).

However, Sims has connections with all the victims – he lived nearby to victim number one, Hannah Lund, went to the same bank as victim three Caitlin O’Brien and furthermore Sims’ fingerprint was found on the window frame in her house. Victim two; however, Maya Defranco (Elena Shaddow) survived the beating but fell into a coma for almost a year.

The team split up now with Sam and Tess on their way to talk to Sims in prison, Maxine (Merrin Dungey) heading to Marla Higgins’ (the latest victim) home and Frankie (Manny Montana) off to notify Maya. The interview with Sims doesn’t give us any ground-breaking evidence or clues, but it does peak the strange radar. He does the usual spiel saying, “I didn’t kill those women, I’m innocent.” But he just seems a little …off.

At Marla Higgins’ house, Maxine runs into Detective Cestero. Nothing ground-breaking in this scene either, but I think Cestero and Maxine used to date. Interesting…

When Hayes and Frankie turn up to Maya’s house we see the place decked out in security precautions and cameras for the front stoop and for the driveway. I’m sure there are more around the back and throughout the house that we can’t see as there are bars on the windows and an incredibly precautious Maya behind the door. Honestly, I don’t blame her what happened to her was incredibly traumatic. Finding out that there may be another B.O.K. or that the real one wasn’t locked up “threw” her. This scene at least yields a new piece of evidence; the killer was wearing coveralls.

Later that night, Hayes and Wallace are eating dinner, being overly disgustingly cute when Tess calls. Sims is on WABC confessing to being the BOK. Well, that came out of left field. Tess is still unconvinced though, she goes back to the prison and finds out that after 10 years in jail, Sims has gotten all too comfortable with prison life, the routine and the structure. He is scared for what awaits him in freedom, scared of not being able to fit in because he knows he’s strange and a little eccentric. Tess comforts him, being the sweet flower child she is she assures him that the CIU will help him get into the reintegration program once he is released. Upon hearing this he backtracks, once again insisting on his innocence.

The team are now on a new track having found out that on the night of Caitlin’s murder Sims clocked out of work at 5:30pm, but the coroner put time of death at no later than 6pm. This has the team questioning whether Sims could have murdered her in the first place. Of course, Sam retorts arguing that he was already in coveralls which saved him some time (I swear everything out of this guy’s mouth is a contradiction to whatever was just said). The team split up once again, Frankie is rerunning the print to see if it was indeed Sims while Sam and Maxine head to the warehouse to investigate if there were any holes there (someone else punched him out, machine wasn’t calibrated correctly).

Lu Jin (Von Flores) the manager at the company Sims used to work at gives Sims a stellar review having worked the floor with him 10 years ago. He assures the duo that Sims would never let anyone punch in or out for him and that the machines were working correctly. However, they do find out that Sims often delivered windows to contractors throughout the city, which very well explains how his fingerprints got in victim three’s home.

Meanwhile Cestero has been running his investigation and has just arrested a suspect in Higgins’ murder. Hayes is able to convince Wallace to let CIU have access to this suspect (through blackmail I may add, real healthy relationship) to which Hayes allows Tess to talk to Sims. Her and Maxine head down to the station to meet Joe Kaplan (Shawn Parsons) and while it’s pretty clear after a few moments that he is not the killer, Detective Cestero is convinced otherwise – this is the kind of attitude that was probably responsible for him convicting the wrong man.

Despite not being the killer, several witnesses place Joe at the scene. The stories line up perfectly yet the CIU team aren’t convinced. While discussing Joe’s profile with Tess later that night, Sam gets an email containing Joe’s sealed juvenile record. It reveals he was accused of molesting his sister, who has the same dark hair and blue eyes as the B.O.K.’s victims, when he was 12 years old. Joe refutes these claims completely, claiming his stepfather “just saw what he wanted to see.”

When they talk to Sonya (Joe’s sister) she too denies any such occurrence and supports her brother’s claim about their stepfather. They were simply playing a game, but he overreacted. She informs the duo that their stepfather grabbed Joe’s arm so hard it permanently damaged his nerves – doctors say he isn’t able to lift his arm over his head.

With this new information, Frankie sets up an experiment to prove to the detective that Joe couldn’t have killed the women – much more force would have been needed to batter the woman in that way. Now out of options, Wallace gives him one telling the two teams (CIU and NYPD) to work together to find the real killer. Tess suggests they look into the 10-year gap between killings – the team throw around some suggestions, but Frankie seems to have nailed it, maybe he was incarcerated?

The team get files for men incarcerated shortly after the third victim was killed, looking for a white male between 5’5” and 6’ with a violent criminal history – which really doesn’t narrow things down much for the team who are combing through boxes upon boxes of files. Just about when they’re ready to take a break, Tess hits the jackpot – Don Cutler (David Huband). He is one of the witnesses who said he saw Joe outside the latest victim’s apartment and was arrested for beating up his girlfriend weeks after victim three was killed. When he was a child he was abused by his foster mother, who…you guessed it…is a dead ringer for all the victims – dark hair, blue eyes and uses Black Orchid #4.

Maxine and Cestero head to Cutler’s apartment only to find it empty (for a guy who’s just spent his last 10-years in prison, his apartment is really swanky). Not all is lost though as they find a lock picking gun and a floor plan for an apartment (not his). They figure out the floor plan is that of Maya Defranco’s – Cutler has gone to finish what he started 10 years ago.

Police race to Maya’s apartment and by the time Maxine and Cestero get there a squad car is already parked outside. Walking into the house they find Cutler lying on the ground, wearing coveralls and two shots in his chest – Maya had shot him.

Maxine and Cestero share a moment and he seems to have bitten his pride and his face doesn’t make me want to slap him at any given moment anymore. So, I guess that’s good. Clark Sims is released from prison albeit apprehensive to what awaits him behind the doors, he ventures through.

Hayes and Wallace are having a drink that night in her apartment, Wallace bringing up the discovery of Amelia Earhart’s skeleton, interesting choice of conversation topic. However, it doesn’t last long and they finally admit that they can no longer and should no longer avoid talking about work (like they have been all episode). Their jobs are a big thing in their lives and despite the fact they will probably fight about it, it sure is better than the conversations they’ve been having…