CSI:New York

Season 1 - Episode 12 - Recycling

Written by Timothy J. Lea and Zachary Reiter
Directed by Alex Zakrzewski

Detectives Mac, Aiden and Flack find their patience severely tested when snooty dog owners place their prize animals’ chances of winning a kennel club show over solving the death of one of the animal handlers.

The search for a new champion at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, takes a backseat to that for the killer of Elaine Curtis, a twenty-something dog handler found dead next to the Red Cross tent in the show’s backstage area. She has a knitting needle stuck through her heart and bite marks on her neck. The initial interrogations are not very useful: the emergency doctor was in his tent while the murder took place and did not hear a thing, while the owner of the needle is a neurotic dog owner who is widely known to calm herself and her dog before each show by knitting.

Then Aiden finds a clue: a trail of paw prints leading away from Elaine’s body. When they also find a dog’s hair on Elaine’s body, they are able to narrow it down to a Spaniel, or small hunting dog. Mac has the police round up the dogs for his own dog show – but instead of the best-behaved animal or the most elaborate coiffure, he is just looking to see whether any of them has blood on its paws.

Mac finds one that clearly stepped through a pool of blood – and although the dog may still be innocent, its handler, a man in his late 40s named Alvin Marbert, is looking very guilty indeed. He admits that he had a relationship with Elaine, but that he couldn’t tell anyone, as his employer would surely fire him if she found out he was dating someone working for the competition. Mac asks him if he can explain the bite marks Elaine had. Alvin is silent for a while. Then he reveals that he and Elaine used to enjoy pretending to be dogs while having sex, barking and playfully biting each other. Their investigation takes a turn when Mac discovers Elaine’s case containing her dog’s supplies has been broken into and the contents tampered with - and the trail leads them to the killer.

Meanwhile, Stella and Danny investigate the death of Michael Starling, a bike messenger who was stabbed to death while racing through the streets of New York. His employer says Michael was probably his best man. He was fast. However, that also meant he was taking work away from his colleagues – could one of them resented him enough to kill him?

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