Capitol Offense

An old friend of Gibbs, implicated in a murder, asks Gibbs for his help and someone steals Abby's cupcake. Read the BeeSight BeeCap to find out what else happened on the third episode of the sixth season of NCIS and join in the discussion.

BeeCap

A couple is riding mountain bikes through the woods, the man wipes out in a pond and a body floats to the surface. The body is identified as Lt. Kerry McClellan, a naval officer and liaison to the Senate. The NCIS gang is called in to investigate.

Back at the office, Ziva gives Abby a decadent chocolate cupcake to thank her for letting her stay at her place for the night.

The woman was killed by a gunshot to her back with no exit wound. A stain on her back indicates that she was killed elsewhere and brought to the pond later. As the clouds roll in, the gang finds a footprint in the mud. Gibbs tells them to preserve the evidence before the rain destroys it, then drives off.

Agent Gibbs meets with his longtime friend Senator Patrick Kiley (played by Tim DeKay) who tells him that he saw that a female Navy Lieutenant was murdered and asked if it was McClellan. Gibbs tells him it was and Kiley confesses to having an affair with the victim. He tells Gibbs that he knows he's going to be a suspect and that he has an energy bill that's supposed to go up for a vote next week. He asks Gibbs if he can try to keep his name out of the news until after he gets his legislation passed. Gibbs says he'll try, but won't cover up for any crime. Kiley also tells Gibbs that McClellan recently had an argument with her commanding officer.

The rest of the NCIS team combs the victim's apartment looking for clues. They find an anonymous love note and figure that she was in a relationship with a married man. They talk to her neighbors and find out that she was a loner.

When Gibbs reunites with the rest of the team, he tells them that he's going to talk to the victim's commanding officer, Admiral Charles Graves (played by William Bumiller). The gang wonders why Gibbs is suddenly leaving on secret missions and how he knew that there was an altercation between the victim and Graves

Gibbs asks Graves about the disagreement he had with McClellan. Graves said that some technical details were leaked a few days before the official report was released and McClellan wanted to do a write up about it. Graves told her it was no big deal, but she persisted.

Back at the office, McGee pulls the victim's phone records and sees that she's made a lot of calls to the Washington D.C. Congressional switchboard. They figure she's trying to conceal her contact, otherwise, she would have just called the congressperson's direct line.

Gibbs finds Abby dusting the refrigerator for prints. She explains that someone stole her cupcake and she's determined to find out who the thief is. She also tells Gibbs that she was able to recover carpet fibers from the body that indicate the body was in a car with a gray interior and she's researching the fibers to find what kind of car they came from.

Director Vance calls Gibbs into his office and plays a voice mail message from a computerized voice telling them they can find the murder weapon in a sewer ditch. DiNozzo and McGee go to the location with a metal detector and after falling in the murky water, McGee finds the gun.

Abby finds that the bullet from the victim matches the gun recovered by McGee, confirming it as the murder weapon. There are no prints on the gun, but the serial number is still intact. Ziva tracks the serial number to an unregistered 1949 weapon. She saw that the pin on the gun was new and was able to find out that it was purchased by Otis Tripp.

Gibbs suddenly leaves to find Senator Kiley. Gibbs tells him that the gun was owned by Kiley's dead father in law. Kiley says that the gun was locked up in his cabinet and doesn't know how it could have been used in the murder. He tells Gibbs that he did not kill McClellan and says he's being framed.

Vance calls Gibbs into his office to play another anonymous message. The woman says that she knows the murder weapon has been recovered and wants to know what is taking so long to make an arrest. She asks if Gibbs is covering up for an old friend. Vance asks Gibbs what it means, the Senator Kiley enters the office. He tells Vance all about his affair with the victim, but thinks he's being framed. He says that he has an enemy, Reed Talbot, who is a lobbyist for big oil and wants to make sure his energy bill fails.

DiNozzo and Gibbs go with Kiley to his house and meet Cole Erickson (played by Marcus Chait), Kiley's Chief of Staff. Kiley's wife Lynn (played by Susan Floyd) enters the room and Kiley pulls her aside to tell her about his situation. Cole takes Gibbs and DiNozzo to the gun room to look for prints. The cabinet is locked, so they ask Cole if he knows where the key is. He tells them it's in a drawer and they take it for evidence.

Kiley's wife goes to Gibbs at his house and says she need someone to talk to. She admits to knowing about the affair, but didn't know all the details, just that they would meet at Cole's apartment. She tells Gibbs that she's upset, but she'll find a way to work through it. As she leaves, she tells Gibbs that there's no way her husband, a former Marine, would have shot anyone in the back.

Abby finds that the Senator's gun cabinet had four sets of prints, his, his wife's, the chief of staff's and a mystery print. She also found that the carpet fibers belong to a Jeep Cherokee. Abby then collects DNA from all of her co-workers.

Since the oil lobbyist is still a suspect, Ziva is sent to try to obtain his fingerprint. She poses as a person gathering signatures to stop an initiative that would drop the speed limit down to 55 mph. Reed Talbot (played by Bill Sage) happily signs and Ziva bags his pen as evidence, but his print is not a match.

DiNozzo suspects that Cole is responsible for the murder since he has a Jeep Cherokee. McGee finds out that the anonymous messages were made from a laptop. The crew go to Cole's apartment and when he doesn't answer, they break in. They find Cole on the floor, dead, with a plastic bag tied around his head. They find a computer typed suicide note/murder admission, addressed to Senator Kiley. Ziva finds a spot on the carpet that was recently cleaned. It tests positive for McClellan's blood. McGee recovers Cole's phone and says it's the same one that made the anonymous calls. Kiley comes to the apartment and asks to see Cole, but Gibbs turns him away.

At the office, Abby gathers all her co-workers and tells them she knows McGee is the one who stole her cupcake. He tells her she has no evidence since he wouldn't have left any fingerprints. She tells him that he didn't leave fingerprints on the refrigerator, but he did leave them on a brand new box of latex gloves. He admits to eating her cupcake and tells her it's for her own good since she wanted to go gluten-free.

Gibbs enters the office and tells McGee to look up Cole's phone records. The team is confused since they have a confession, but follow Gibb's orders. Gibbs then tells Vance to hold off a few hours on the press conference. Gibbs then goes to Kiley and places him under arrest.

Gibbs explains that Cole was 50 miles away talking to his mother at the time of the anonymous calls, so he couldn't have been the one who left the messages. Kiley's wife walks in and starts to confess. Gibbs said that she gave herself away when she said Kiley would never shoot anyone in the back since that was a detail that was never released to the press. She says killing McClellan was an accident, but Gibbs points out that Cole was murdered in cold blood. Senator Kiley admits to killing Cole and the couple is taken away.

BeeThoughts

I think Gibbs knew his friend was guilty right away, but wanted to be absolutely sure before he singled him out to the rest of the team. I don't really understand why the couple thought killing the chief of staff would help their cause, but I guess they thought they could use him as their fall guy. If they had thought it through a little longer, they probably would have realized that the chief of staff had no reason to murder the Senator's mistress. If it had been a lobbyist who had framed the Senator, he would have never done it himself, he would have probably paid someone else to do it for him.

- Kristine R.