Leapin' Lizards (CSI)

Infobox Television episode | Title = Leapin Lizards
Series=


Caption =
Season = 7
Episode = 22
Guests=
Airdate = May 3, 2007
Writer = Evan Dunsky
Director = Kenneth Fink
Prev = Ending Happy
Next = The Good, the Bad, and the Dominatrix

"Leapin' Lizards" is the 22nd episode of the of the television series "".

Plot

Police, including Brass, converge on a farmhouse and automatic gunfire erupts from a window. From inside the house, pig farmer Hank Connors yells that they will never take him alive, and when the police enter, he shoots himself in the head. As Nick and Brass search the house, they note that Connors feared an impending apocalypse, and that they can find no trace of Chyna De Vere. Warrick and Grissom find blood in the bed of Connors' truck. They also see mounted game heads on the wall and are shocked to discover Chyna's head also mounted.

Greg explains to Catherine the known details of the case. Chyna had recently separated from her husband Preston, who has not been seen since her disappearance. When CSIs went to her home to investigate, they detected a blood pool on the carpet, but the suspect steam-cleaned the carpet, destroying the DNA. However, one blood drop from an unidentified female remained on the carpet. Soil in the apartment matched soil found around Connors' ranch. Connors was in a club with Chyna's husband, a club which believed that reptilian aliens controlled the governments of Earth.

Grissom finds a film reel in Connors' closet - on it, a man teaches about reptilian aliens coming to Earth and taking over the planet. He teaches that an alien can only be killed by cutting off its head.

Brass questions Shannon Turner (played by Ally Sheedy), another member of the club. She was friendly with Connors, but she claims to not know Chyna. Greg arrives to take a DNA swab from Shannon, but she believes him to be a reptilian and goes berserk. She bites Greg's hand, breaking the skin, and Greg takes his sample from the bite. Brass and Catherine process Shannon's apartment and discover that she was a Gold Level player at the Palermo, the casino where Chyna was a blackjack dealer. They also find a notebook filled with sketches of aliens and a warrior woman, a mug with Shannon and Preston's picture on it, and a sword.

Doc Robbins and Dave take Chyna's head off the mount and examine the skin and skull. They find an incision on the skin and a matching tool mark on the skull. Catherine finds Chyna's fingerprints on the sword blade and Shannon's prints on the handle. By using gel impressions, she and Greg determine that the cut on Chyna's skull was made by Shannon's sword. Warrick learns that the blood in Connors' truck bed was Chyna's, and the drop of blood on the carpet was Shannon's. The CSIs realize that Chyna was defending herself against Shannon's attack.

Nick remembers a murder case where bodies were fed to pigs, and searches the pig pen on Connors' property. He finds a human femur in the mud and determines that it is from a human female the same height as Chyna. He and Warrick also find human bones in the ashes of a firepit, as well as two wedding bands inscribed with Chyna's and Preston's names.

Archie reviews the surveillance videos from the Palermo and finds Shannon sitting at Chyna's table. He and Sara learn that Shannon only gambled at Chyna's table, and Sara speculates that Shannon was trying to gain Chyna's trust. Brass interrogates Shannon again about Chyna's and Preston's deaths. Shannon claims that Preston, a keeper of the wisdom of the ages, cannot be killed because his cells regenerate. Grissom asks Shannon about the sketches from her apartment and learns that Shannon, thinking that she was the protector of mankind, slayed Chyna, whom she believed to be a reptilian.

Upon further review, Archie finds footage of Preston visiting Chyna at the Palermo on the day she disappeared. They had a fight, and Preston gave Chyna his wedding ring - Archie and Warrick realize that this means Preston's body was not burned in the firepit.

Doc Robbins processes the bones found at Connors' farm and finds a bullet embedded in a vertebra. Warrick and Nick test-fire a gun found in Connors' house and it is a match to the bullet that killed Chyna.

Preston is found naked, wandering in the desert. He claims to have been abducted by reptilians for the past week. He breaks down crying when he learns that Chyna is dead. Brass asks him where he was the night Chyna was killed, and Preston says he was with a Clarissa Niles. Brass questions Clarissa, who describes an alien abduction scenario in which Preston suddenly went missing. Brass calls Preston a con man, and Clarissa angrily counters that Preston cured her cancer with an injection. However, Brass shows her documentation and evidence showing Preston's fraud and confronts her with the fact that Preston got Shannon to kill Chyna and Clarissa to cover it up.

Greg and Catherine find the same soil from Chyna's carpet on the tires of Clarissa's car. They also find Preston's clothing and wallet in the car, and a steam cleaner in the trunk. The CSIs finds a hair in the steam cleaner that matches Chyna's, and a fingerprint that matches Preston. They deduce that Shannon killed Chyna, Connors cut off her head, Preston cleaned up the mess, and Clarissa provided an alibi for him. Brass arrests Preston for conspiracy to commit murder.

At home, Sara finds the love letter that Grissom wrote her while he was on sabbatical (which quotes, in part Shakespeare's Sonnet 47). In the next room over, Grissom constructs a miniature room, similar to those found at crime scenes throughout the season. A voice over narrative taken from the film discovered at Connors' house can be heard saying, "...unless we stop killing one another, and focus on the real enemies. They are among us."

Critical analysis

The background involves the fringe conspiracy theory, as exposed by David Icke, that there may be groups of shape-shifting reptilian humanoids posing as humans, in particular world leaders and those in positions of importance.

The Canadian farmer who Nick mentioned at the beginning of the episode (when describing a man who fed his female victims to pigs) was likely a reference to Robert Pickton, a man who allegedly killed dozens of sex trade workers and fed them to his pigs.

Continuity

"Shooting Stars" also included a UFO cult with a conman posing as the groups charismatic leader.

See also

*

External links

*imdb title|id=0991646|title=Leapin' Lizards
*Tv.com episode|id=1002094|title=Leapin' Lizards
*csiguide episode|id=338|title=Leapin' Lizards
* [http://www.csifiles.com/episodes/csi/season7/leapin'_lizards.shtml "Leapin' Lizards"] at CSI Files