Criminal Minds (TV Series)

Miasma (2018)

Matthew Gray Gubler: Dr. Spencer Reid

Quotes 

• [last lines] 

  Emily Prentiss : I have an announcement to make. I have been suspended from active duty. I've turned in my badge and my gun.

  Penelope Garcia : What... I don't understand.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : For how long?

  Emily Prentiss : Indefinitely. Uh, JJ will continue being acting Unit Chief, but as of today, Assistant Director Linda Barnes will be personally overseeing the unit.

  David Rossi : Are we under investigation?

  Emily Prentiss : Yes, we are under investigation. And I tried, but with the suspension, I can't protect you. I'm sorry.

• Jennifer Jareau : Okay, two more of the initial ten victims have been identified. Twenty-eight year old dentist Tyler Roberts and teen runaway Heather Pineda. According to missing person reports and the timeline the M.E. sent over, they're most likely victims number four and five.

  Dr. Tara Lewis : This guy's victimology is all over the place. I mean, he's bouncing back and forth between the vulnerable and working professionals.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : These may all be victims of opportunity, but there's a measure of compassion to these kills. It doesn't feel random.

  Matt Simmons : Yeah, he doesn't want them to suffer. It's almost like he's putting them to sleep.

  Luke Alvez : Or putting them out of their misery.

• Dr. Tara Lewis : This unsub has been back and forth across the city at all hours of the day, so he's clearly using some kind of vehicle to hunt.

  Jennifer Jareau : Well, he's most likely unemployed.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : We may not understand his ritual, but we know he feels an overwhelming need to complete it; enough to risk going back to the area despite a heavy police presence. These cemeteries are important to him, if not for personal reasons, then for what they represent.

  Jennifer Jareau : So, did he lose someone? Is that what triggered all of this?

  Luke Alvez : We should increase patrols in and around the graveyard and within a two-mile radius, and if they are important to him, he'll probably revisit.

  Jennifer Jareau : And ketamine is available on the street, but it's pricey, so, uh, we should also check in to vet offices, medical providers, see if any of them have had any recent break-ins.

• Dr. Tara Lewis : All right, the victim's name is Carl Kevork, and he escaped the crash with only minor injuries. The EMTs who transported him to the hospital said he had been heavily drugged, most likely ketamine, like the others.

  Matt Simmons : Carl's a big guy. The unsub must have gotten the dosage wrong.

  Dr. Tara Lewis : Well, Carl doesn't remember much. I mean, he recalls running down an alley, seeing a van, getting inside.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : We profiled he'd be unemployed. It looks like our unsub's been living out of this van for a while.

• Dr. Spencer Reid : Hey, guys, given our geo-profile, I think I have a pretty good guess as to where our unsub has been holding his victims.

• Dr. Spencer Reid : Medico della peste. Jeremy Paulson and Carl Kevork both described themselves as feeling ill before they were abducted.

  Matt Simmons : You think that's why he targeted them?

  Dr. Spencer Reid : And it's his job to take care of them before they contaminate others. He's ridding the streets of the infected.

• Dr. Spencer Reid : Medieval medical practitioners believed that chickens could absorb illness. They would rub the birds all over the bodies of the diseased in an attempt to rid them of their sickness.

  Jennifer Jareau : See, uh, this is a venetian bird mask. During the 17th century, doctors would stuff these with herbs and spices and wear them to protect against infection.

  Chief Thomas Wheeler : From the plague.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : That, along with the burning of the bodies and the burial ground, Tremé Cemetery number two, and the fact that it was originally built to house victims who died from cholera and smallpox, tells us that this unsub believes himself to be a modern-day plague doctor.

  Dr. Tara Lewis : A vigilante or angel of death whose job it is to stop sick people from spreading disease.

  David Rossi : Our unsub wants to eradicate not just the sick, but the sickness within them.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : In fact, it wasn't until the middle of the 19th century that humorism, the belief that illness was caused by an imbalance of the fluids in the body, was discredited. Before that, it was believed that there were four humors in the body: black bile, yellow bile, blood, and phlegm, all of which were susceptible to miasma, or bad air, that carried disease.

  David Rossi : Our unsub's fixation on these ancient medical practices speaks to a very specific kind of stressor.

  Jennifer Jareau : It indicates a distrust in modern medicine. He or a loved one may have suffered a loss brought on by illness or disease.

  David Rossi : Or he may blame modern medicine for failing to save a loved one.

  Jennifer Jareau : Our unsub was living on the fringes of society. His van was not just his means of transport, it was his whole life. And now that he's lost it, there's no telling what he'll do next.

• Jennifer Jareau : We thought our unsub was on a mission to cleanse the streets, but it's way more complicated than that. This whole ritual of his is an act of mercy in his mind. It didn't just come out of thin air.

  Matt Simmons : I think he's been thinking about it, preparing for it in some way.

  Jennifer Jareau : Exactly. But we haven't found anything connecting our unsub to the first body, Hunter Dillon. What if Hunter wasn't his first victim?

  Luke Alvez : That would mean there's another victim out there we haven't identified.

  Jennifer Jareau : Okay, so our unsub started by putting people out of their misery, saving them from their sickness. What if the woman he lost, who was sick, didn't just die, but she was his first kill?

  Dr. Spencer Reid : Then everything he's done since would be about reliving that moment, justifying that action.

  Luke Alvez : These murders would be about easing his own guilt.

• Matt Simmons : There's plenty of evidence of this woman in the van. Just no DNA and no prints.

  Jennifer Jareau : Okay, what about her belongings?

  Dr. Spencer Reid : We have clothes and blankets.

  Luke Alvez : A small jewelry box.

  Matt Simmons : Uh, some toiletries.

  Jennifer Jareau : And this bouquet. Why would someone keep dead, rotting flowers?

  Dr. Spencer Reid : It could be of personal significance, an emotional attachment that overrides his compulsion for cleanliness.

  Jennifer Jareau : Okay, did the CSUs find any prints or DNA on the plastic wrapping?

  Luke Alvez : No, but the wrapping did have a label that led to a flower shop. The CSUs followed up but came up empty-handed.

  Matt Simmons : That's because they're not Penelope.

  [dialing his phone] 

  Matt Simmons : Garcia, we need your help.

  Penelope Garcia : Bring it.

• Jennifer Jareau : Tremé Cemetery's an active site. It's famous. It's the oldest cemetery in the city.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : Home to Marie Laveau, the voodoo queen of New Orleans, known for her powers of clairvoyance, healing, and intimidation. Legend has it that she once helped free a man accused of murder by praying for 72 hours straight with three hot peppers in her mouth.

  Luke Alvez : Voodoo queen. I mean, is that what this is? Some kind of ritualistic killing?

  Matt Simmons : I see these Xs here. They're used to denote the grave of a powerful voodoo practitioner.

  Jennifer Jareau : Markings like this aren't uncommon in these parts. These look like they've been here for a while.

  David Rossi : Could be the reason our unsub chose this particular crypt to do his bidding.

  Emily Prentiss : New Orleans PD wants us there ASAP. There is one more thing. I won't be coming along. JJ will be acting as Unit Chief in my absence. I have a meeting with Assistant Director Barnes tomorrow morning. It's short notice, but as far as I understand, it's just a standard administrative review, so I'm sure everything will be fine.

  Jennifer Jareau : Okay. Um, wheels up in thirty.

• Luke Alvez : First Barnes pulls you in for a late-night meeting, then Prentiss. I mean, it feels like something's going on.

  Dr. Tara Lewis : Yeah, and why all the urgency? I mean, couldn't it have waited 'till we all got back?

  David Rossi : Something must have triggered an internal review.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : It's me. It's been almost a year since my arrest in Mexico.

  Jennifer Jareau : It's just an annual review. Standard operating procedure.

  Luke Alvez : Matt, you worked with Barnes on your last assignment. How much trouble are we in?

  Matt Simmons : I mean, I hate to say it, but this is the exact same thing that she did with the IRT before disbanding the unit. She started with the head of the team, then she worked her way down. She tried to pit us against each other.

  David Rossi : Barnes' reputation precedes her. She's climbed the ranks well.

  Dr. Tara Lewis : Well, clearly she's good at her job.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : We're better.

  Jennifer Jareau : And we haven't done anything wrong. We can't worry about this right now because we have a case. People need our help.

• Chief Thomas Wheeler : Five of the ten victims have been identified. These three, Jason Chambers, Lindsay Montoya, and Gary Keulchy, were homeless. And these two, Sonequa Fox and Daniel Rikers, were working professionals.

  Jennifer Jareau : And Mr. Rikers and Ms. Fox were both reported missing a week and a half ago.

  Chief Thomas Wheeler : That's correct. They both left their homes in mid-city and never returned.

  Matt Simmons : And the three homeless victims were last seen in a shelter near the French Quarter?

  Chief Thomas Wheeler : Yes. We periodically check the night roll calls when we find a body. They were most likely panhandling in the area.

  David Rossi : Our unsub crossed racial and gender lines.

  Luke Alvez : And he's mobile.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : You know, realistically, it's likely each victim was abducted, killed, and disposed of individually.

  Jennifer Jareau : We need to see what the M.E. can tell us about the timeline of the murders.

  Dr. Tara Lewis : And we'd expect an unsub like this to start with high-risk victims like the homeless and then move on to low-risk victims like Sonequa and Daniel, but until we ID the remaining victims, it's really hard to draw any conclusions.

  Luke Alvez : So he'd need somewhere to hold them and do his bloodletting business before bringing them back to the crypt.

  Dr. Spencer Reid : I've already started a geo-profile, but the more we can learn about the victims' last moments, the more accurate it'll be.