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Criminal Minds Season 12 Episodes
Season 12 Episode Guide
22 Episodes 2016 - 2017
Episode 1
The Crimson King
Wed, Sep 28, 201643 mins
The eighth of thirteen serial killers that recently escaped from prison has just been apprehended. The latest capture and many of the others were led by Agent Luke Alvez, who sees his role in the FBI solely as a manhunter. He accepts the invitation to join the BAU in the search for number nine, Daniel Cullen aka the Crimson King, who seems to have surfaced in the Tempe, Arizona area. Alvez's interest in Cullen is a personal one. Cullen's latest victim, a young man named Brian Phillips, emerges from the desert with all the hallmarks of Cullen's victims: his arms bound behind his head to an arm stretcher, and a word carved into his abdomen, in this case the letters "BAU". Hotch and Tara quickly notice that the abdominal wounds are not hallmark to Cullen, being much more shallow than Cullen would have inflicted. In interviewing Brian and gleaning from him what little he remembers of his abduction, the team comes to the conclusion that the perpetrator of this crime is not Cullen but the mastermind of the prison break, Peter Lewis aka Mr. Scratch. Being a math genius, Lewis would have mapped out to the highest probability of success his plan, meaning that Brian's discovery may not have been by accident. Tara also discovers that Brian suffered from dissociative identity disorder, which is the reason he was chosen by Lewis for whatever his long game. Reid figures that Lewis chose the Tempe area to emerge in because there was a highly regarded institution in the area that treated young people suffering from DID, it where Brian himself was treated when he was younger. The team believes that people who attended the institution may be Lewis' next targets if he did not achieve with Brian what he was after.
Episode 2
Sick Day
Wed, Oct 5, 201643 mins
Beyond her bandaged burnt hand, Luke can tell that JJ is out of sorts because of the goings-on with their just completed last case. But it isn't until JJ arrives home in the middle of the night to find Will awake with the baby who has the croup that she is forced to talk about what has happened as Will will not let her go to bed before she gets the specifics of what is bothering her out in the open. That case, which took them to the Los Angeles area, began with the discovery of two teenagers, an older girl and younger boy, who were found burnt to death together in an abandoned building. The two, who were not related, were abducted in two separate incidents days apart in different parts of the city, both abducted in broad daylight, both middle class. This case mimics one in San Diego a few years ago, with a few differences, namely that those two victims were at risk runaways, and were discovered away from where they were burned. With this case, another teenaged girl, Francesca Morales, was abducted by the time the team landed in Los Angeles, meaning that they had to work fast to prevent who would be the younger boy being abducted and the two killed by fire. Although JJ admits that these types of cases have been more difficult when she became a mother, not only because children are involved but that she places herself in the place of the parents in dealing with them, it is a specific decision that she makes associated with this case which she attributes to her own personal family situation that she believes affected the outcome.
Episode 3
Taboo
Wed, Oct 12, 201640 mins
With Hotch and Lewis both temporarily away, Emily comes back to the BAU for extra support until their return. The first case upon Emily's return takes the team to Boynton Beach, Florida, where the dead body of a young woman is discovered in an illegal dump site, her body encased in concrete in a gasoline drum. She apparently was buried alive. Shortly after the team arrives in Florida, a second and third victim are discovered, also encased in concrete in gasoline drum, also discovered at illegal dump sites, also buried alive. Besides racial differences, the victims have in common being middle class devoted single mothers of sons, choosing what they considered safe living environments to protect their sons. Because the third victim is discovered hours after her encasement, the M.E. is able to discover more about what the unsub is doing to his victims, namely performing chemical lobotomies using concentrated chlorine injected into the nasal passage. The team will have to determine the reason for the lobotomies on these single mothers, and the reason for the illegal dump sites as the body dump sites to narrow in on the unsub.
Episode 4
Keeper
Wed, Oct 26, 201643 mins
The BAU heads to the Appalachian Trail less than one hundred miles away from Quantico as State Trooper Jim Carson, investigating a shoplifting case by a homeless man, found the man's camp just off the trail - but no man - his camp which included a bag of body parts. After separating the body parts, the medical examiner determines that they belong to four middle aged Caucasian men and one twenty-something Caucasian woman. The bodies were crudely hacked apart, the victims killed anywhere from approximately one year ago to a few weeks ago, the woman the latest victim. The store where the shoplifting occurred has surveillance footage of the homeless man, who, according to one account, looks like he would not have the cognitive ability to tie his shoes. All he stole was dog food and nothing for himself to eat, leading to the team believing that his food source is his victims, and that the killings are not targeted but rather incidents of opportunity. When the team is able to identify the female victim, they change their victimology, now believing the woman was the anomaly as a witness to something perpetrated by the homeless man, who truly is targeting white, middle aged men. The team is eventually able to apprehend the homeless man, but with another potential victim having gone missing in the meantime. The homeless man, who indeed seems to be suffering some some mental issues, calls himself Todd, and seems to be fixated on finding his dog, Cormac, the reason for the stolen dog food. The team will have to work their way through Todd's seeming emotional issues, including the role of Cormac in the killings, if they have any hope of finding the missing man, unless there is another piece to the puzzle. Through the investigation, Reid goes through his own roller coaster of emotions in issues dealing with his mother.
Episode 5
The Anti-Terror Squad
Wed, Nov 9, 201641 mins
The BAU team members travel to Winona, Minnesota, where three of the four members of the Bergstrom family are shot dead execution style in their home while they are sleeping, with the only surviving family member being high school student Amanda Bergstrom, who only survived because she broke curfew and thus was not home at the time of the murders. Despite being a model family on the surface, Garcia discovers that there were a few skeletons in their family closet which could have been the reason for the murders. Although she couldn't have committed the murders herself, Amanda is also under investigation if only because she is the sole beneficiary of her parents' life insurance policy. The team's other theory - that the Bergstroms were only a surrogate - becomes stronger when the Doherty family is similarly murdered in their home, the only survivor being Matt Doherty, a classmate of Amanda's, albeit without the two traveling in the same social circle. As Matt survived by hiding in a closet, the team begins to believe that who the unsub is actually targeting is the survivors, as both Amanda and Matt were known to have bullied other students at their high school, without any repercussions for their bullying. The theory is thus that the unsub wanted Amanda and Matt to feel the suffering that the unsub himself felt when he would have been their age. Because of the control shown in the murders, the team points the unsub to be in his late twenties or early thirties. But when a third family is targeted, the BAU has the profile figured out, with they needing to narrow down the possible individuals as being the unsub. Meanwhile, Garcia tries to make olive branch gestures to Alvez, which fall slightly flat.
Episode 6
Elliott's Pond
Wed, Nov 16, 201643 mins
When a known child predator resurfaces at one of Jack Hotchner's ball games, Hotch formally resigns for the BAU and goes off grid in attempt to keep Jack safe. Emily Prentiss is offered the post as the team gets a new case of 3 teen boys by the names of William "Bones" Jarvis, Josh Harmon P.K. Riggins missing from Clayton, Delaware.
Episode 7
Mirror Image
Wed, Nov 30, 201643 mins
Tara is meeting with her three year younger brother Gabriel Lewis, who is visiting from California. Gabriel is as equally brilliant as Tara, but has always led a slightly shady life, he having forgone a fully paid for Yale education when given the opportunity when they were younger. The person who shows up to their meeting claims to be Gabriel, has Gabriel's cell phone (which later shows that he has been in the DC area for about a month, which Tara did not know), but looks nothing like Gabriel. However, the man seems to know every small detail about Gabriel, and Gabriel and Tara's relationship, as well as their relationship with their father, Albert Lewis. As such, Tara arrests the man, and brings him into BAU headquarters for assistance into the matter from her colleagues. Although Tara wants to lead the investigation, Emily knows they have to treat this case like all their others, which means that Tara has to take a back seat into the proceedings. From some information provided to Tara by her father, the team quickly discovers who is behind this situation, which based on their history with the perpetrator means that the entire team is targeted and that any evidence may be a trap to lure the team into a deadly situation. Based on a diagnosis of the situation, the team has two associated missions: to assist the man they have in custody from what he is going through, and by achieving that first goal to locate the real Gabriel who they hope is still alive.
Episode 8
Scarecrow
Wed, Dec 7, 201641 mins
The BAU team members head to Yakima, Washington for their next case. Several 911 calls were made to report a young woman, described to be dressed like a hooker, frantically knocking on doors yelling for help, she who eventually was seen abducted. The reason the BAU is called is that in the search for the woman, two dead bodies are discovered by the local creek, one skeletonized and the other stabbed multiple times, wrapped in burlap and tied with barbed wire, she a known sex worker. The abducted woman is eventually identified as Cherry Rollins who is indeed a prostitute. When the team discovers two more bodies, they are aware that the unsub has been active in his serial murders for some time. They believe the burlap and barbed wire is a religious ritual. The skeletonized victim's identity is important as the team believes she is a connection to the unsub. The team hopes that their presence will throw the unsub off his routine to give Cherry a fighting chance until they can find her and the unsub. Through the case, Reid is a bit distracted by a telephone call from his mother. And by the time the case is over, Prentiss hopes to have news about the latest member of the team, that extra manpower required to deal with Mr. Scratch.
Episode 9
Profiling 202
Wed, Jan 4, 201742 mins
Stephen Walker's first day with the BAU coincides with Rossi's birthday, something he no longer celebrates. It's because a serial killer he helped put away named Tommy Yates aka the Womb Raider - so coined because he mutilated his female victims' reproductive organs along with their vocal cords - made a deal with Rossi that once every year, on his birthday, he would divulge the location of one of his missing victims in return for his death sentence being commuted to life in prison without chance of parole. Yates was one of the inmates who escaped during the mass prison break last year, this the first year he's been out since the deal was made. Yates does contact Rossi today, not to divulge the location of one of his old victims, but of his latest victim, killed following the telephone call. She is Jody Wilson, unlike Yates' other victims who all led a high risk lifestyle. For this case, the team enlists the help of the agents in Rossi's latest advanced profiling seminar - by invitation only - as the seminar is considered on the job training. The collective minds discover that there is more to Yates choosing Jody than meets the eye. They also discover something new about Yates, which they believe means that he will escalate his murders. But they believe the key to finding Yates is the connection he has to Rossi - the "why" which will lead them to the "where". At the end of it all, the agents in the seminar, getting a first hand look at the work, may decide that it is not something they want as their future.
Episode 10
Seek and Destroy
Wed, Jan 11, 201740 mins
Based on information from one of Walker's sources, Prentiss decides the team should investigate a spate of robberies and murders in homes in upscale neighborhoods in the San Diego, California area, the crime scenes showing no evidence of forced entry. The crimes were committed by a gang, evidence that it being mixed male and female. The gang partied in the house - the parties fueled by drugs and alcohol - ultimately trashing it, while the victims were kept tied up in another part of the house, where they were ultimately killed, each victim by a single gunshot. The leader, a probable alpha male, seems to be in control, meaning no drugs or alcohol for him, this belief based on the precision of the gunshot wounds, the same on each victim. Among the gang, there is also a second in command who is fiercely loyal to the leader, and a "muscle" who causes most of the damage to the houses. The remaining members of the gang are the followers - the soldiers - whose primary role is the act of the partying and vandalism. They only steal cash and small electronics, pointing to the gang being relatively young. After the team arrives in San Diego, they discover how the gang gained entry into the homes and if the victims were targeted or randomly chosen. There is also another set of victims upon their arrival, with the M.O. being slightly different in that the husband/wife victims were found in the same room where the partying occurred, and that a family portrait was purposefully targeted in the vandalism. These items point to the act of the crimes being deeply personal to the alpha, and that he is devolving, perhaps with the gang falling apart with that devolution. As they discover more evidence, the team will find that all is not as it first appeared, the strings being pulled by someone who has a specific end goal.
Episode 11
Surface Tension
Wed, Feb 1, 201743 mins
Reid has returned from Houston, where he was visiting his mother who is in a new facility on an experimental drug program. He is called back home from the office while the rest of the team heads off on their next case. It isn't until the team is in the air that they learn that Diana is no longer in the Houston facility, but that she is now living with Reid, as the trial drug was not having the intended effect. Reid had received professional advice that his mother should be in a facility both for her and his own good, but it may be news from a more caring rather than clinical voice which may carry more weight with him. Regardless, he makes himself available to the team, who are in the Tampa, Florida area where two individual deaths have occurred, both now considered murders, the two tied together by ink drawings on the inner arms of the victims, the second victim's whose has one more stroke of the pen than the first. The M.E. is able to determine that the markings were made with the same pen. The death of the first victim, a model suburban soccer mom, was initially ruled a suicide from an overdose of sleeping pills, her own prescription. The second victim, a homeless man, died of a heroin overdose, he who was known not to be a drug user, but rather an advocate for the homeless to get those in need into drug rehab programs. As such, they were both killed using the tools of their life, they presupposing that the unsub forced them to kill themselves. With two subsequent victims, the team also gathers more evidence: that the victims post-mortem were taken to outdoor sites with disturbed ground, and the unsub is connected in some way to fire. The identification of the ink markings in relation to the aspect of the disturbed ground may provide the key to finding where the unsub will strike next.
Episode 12
A Good Husband
Wed, Feb 8, 201741 mins
The team heads to Palm Springs, California where the torso of a body is found in a dumpster, the unsub murderer probably intending that it never would have been found and if so the decapitation a possible counter-measure to not be able to identify the victim. The BAU is called in the possibility that is related to a still unsolved serial murder case in DC from 2004. The Palm Springs authorities are able to identify the victim as twenty-eight year old Paul Mastriano, who was killed after a night at the bar, his drinking which was apparently the cause of his marriage breaking up. Shortly before the BAU's arrival in Palm Springs, a second torso is discovered in the same neighborhood, that victim eventually identified as Brent Miller - similar physical type to Mastriano - who, although unmarried, had just gone through a break-up and was drowning his sorrows in a bar the evening before. The BAU suspects that the victims were targets of opportunity at the bar, who were probably slipped the date rape drug. When a third torso is discovered - eventually identified as a gay man named Dale Ericsson - the team members believe the unsub is devolving but showing more of his true colors: that he is gay, that the murders are meant to scare the gay community, and that he had long harbored a kill fantasy but had been able to redirect that sense of control in some other method in his life, perhaps that control in a personal relationship. They are concerned that the ultimate victim may be the unsub's partner, especially if that person does not return under the unsub's control. Through this case, Reid is concerned about his mother who is still living with him, and this case which he is using as a means to focus his thoughts more objectively on a long term plan for the two of them.
Episode 13
Spencer
Wed, Feb 15, 201742 mins
In a high speed chase in the desert, the local police in a town south of the US-Mexico border apprehend the driver they are chasing, the trunk of his vehicle in which $20,000 worth of heroin and cocaine and a large wad of money is discovered, leading the police to believe that the person apprehended is a drug runner. The driver?: Reid. Reid is barely lucid, he under the influence of some drug. All he can remember is that he went to Mexico to meet with someone named Rosa, who has something to do with his mother. News of Reid's incarceration gets back to team who only knew that Reid had taken some time off to head to Houston to speak to his mother's doctor. Their first inclination is that Reid's predicament was orchestrated by Peter Lewis aka Mr. Scratch, whose campaign against the team members has been quiet of late. They learn that Reid broke protocol in traveling into Mexico on his personal as opposed to work passport, as, although not on a work trip, he did not inform the FBI of his international travel, which he is required to do being a potential high target. They also learn that this cross-border trip was not Reid's first in recent months, each time he informing no one. Prentiss, Rossi and Alvez travel to Mexico to deal with the Mexican authorities, while the rest of the team remains at Quantico to work local leads. Prentiss knows that they have no authority in Mexico and that the Mexican police are working toward their own goals. One of those goals ends up being gathering enough evidence to charge Reid with murder when a Mexican citizen is discovered stabbed to death in Reid's motel room. The team hopes that their colleagues in the International Response Team will be able to assist in Reid's plight.
Episode 14
Collision Course
Wed, Feb 22, 201742 mins
Prentiss remains at the prison on Reid watch, the BAU certain that his plight the work of Mr. Scratch. The FBI as an organization has abandoned him, they not providing him with legal support as he was out of the country without their knowledge and as he was on personal business. As such, Prentiss wants to provide him with the legal services of someone that she trusts, and hopefully will thus act on Reid's best interest. That lawyer is an old friend named Fiona Duncan, who ultimately does take Reid's case after meeting with him. She admits that they will have an uphill battle based on the amount of circumstantial evidence against him, and that he himself cannot remember what happened as he was drugged at the time. In the process, Reid may have to make some difficult decisions. Meanwhile, the rest of the team heads off on their next case, which takes them to Bradenton, Florida, where in two separate incidents in exactly the same spot, two drivers, in the exact same late modeled car, ran over a pedestrian, in one case the pedestrian who was killed. Traffic camera footage shows that the car did not swerve to try and avoid hitting the pedestrian. As the team's initial thought is that the vehicles' computer systems were hacked, Rossi, who is heading this case in Prentiss' place, asks Garcia to accompany them so that she can provide her expertise. The interview with one of the drivers indeed does show that someone was able to assume remote control of the vehicle, with Garcia believing the unsub watching the incident by hacking into the traffic camera system. Subsequent vehicle/pedestrian incidents of a similar nature lead the team to believe that the first two cases were the unsub testing his skills, the later victims surrogates for the person or persons he is ultimately trying to kill. While the profilers work toward finding out where the unsub will strike next by trying to determine who his target(s) is/are, Garcia may be the one to have the ultimate showdown with the unsub in testing who has the greater computer hacking skills.
Episode 15
Alpha Male
Wed, Mar 1, 201742 mins
Denied bail for being deemed a possible flight risk, Reid is sent to a correctional facility in the general population for holding instead of in protective custody in the overcrowded jail. Reid's predicament, which places him at risk, may not be by accident. He receives some unexpected advice on survival on the inside. Meanwhile, the rest of the team is called to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where in two separate incidents half an hour apart, two twentysomethings, a male and a female, were doused in the face with acid. These incidents follow two other closely timed acid dousings one week prior, also of a twentysomething male and female. Of the three victims the team is able to interview, they all state that their attacker was a male wearing an overcoat and baseball cap, and uttered something in a foreign language just prior to the attack. In determining those foreign words, the team is able to track the direct source of the unsub's rage to a website for lonely singles, the outsiders who see themselves as good if not better than the alpha males who seem to get the women. The website posts photos of "alpha males" and "bitches", the victims who look very much like the photos on the website. Ultimately the team is able to identify the unsub, who they know is planning a mass attack. They just have to find out when and where before it happens.
Episode 16
Assistance Is Futile
Wed, Mar 15, 201742 mins
While the rest of the profilers head off on their next case, J.J. stays behind to do "Reid visiting" duties. Beyond updating him on the status of his situation, she also fills him in on what she knows of the case so as to keep his mind occupied. The team has headed to New York City, where a third dead victim has been discovered, all at the hands of who the news outlets are coining the Bone Crusher for the unsub's penchant for breaking and crushing the victims' bones pre-mortem. All the victims have been young attractive females, well educated and considered low risk. All were picked up at a bar and had both alcohol and ecstasy in their systems. Shortly after the team's arrival, the authorities are approached by a woman named Miranda White, who is certain that the Bone Crusher is her twenty-three year old son, Danny White, who she had recently kicked out of the house. She has written evidence - Danny's journal - which outlines his fantasies of breaking and crushing bones of young women. Miranda tells the stories of Danny's troubles since he was a preteen, when her husband/his father abandoned them. Danny was always friendless after that, and one specific incident when he was thirteen demonstrates his fascination with broken bones. What Miranda is also able to tell them connects Danny back to places of comfort and isolation. How quickly they can find Danny may depend on how willing Miranda is to open up completely about their life, especially how insecure and friendless Danny has been able to act the confident person in being able to easily pick up attractive women at a bar. The team may get a break with J.J.'s arrival back on the scene, she and Garcia who discover who they believe was an earlier fourth victim. Meanwhile back at the prison, Shaw continues to provide guidance to life behind bars to Reid, who will have to decide on his own whether to heed the advice, especially as another inmate, a seemingly vulnerable young man named Delgado, may be the next target.
Episode 17
In the Dark
Wed, Mar 22, 201741 mins
The BAU heads to Burlington, Vermont to deal with what looks on the surface to be two unsubs, that surface implication which they believe may be unlikely seeing as to the small 40,000 population of the city. The first unsub is meticulous, leaving none of his own DNA behind at the scene, and shoots hunters in the woods with a single long distance shot through the heart. As it is not hunting season, the team believes the three victims of this first unsub are poachers, something that the M.E., who knew all three, can confirm, he stating that none were considered pillars of the community. The second unsub is haphazard, who stabs his victims to death in nighttime home invasions. The only thing tying the two sets of murders together is that the fatal stab in all three cases thus far have been the one to the heart. The team's initial assumption of there only being one unsub is confirmed when they are able to retrieve some DNA from one of the hunting crime scenes. Lewis comes up with a theory as to the differing natures of the daytime versus nighttime murders, which is supported by evidence at a subsequent crime scene. They ultimately believe that the key to discovering the identity of and capturing the unsub is the targets that he chooses, not the people themselves but the houses in which they live, they believing those houses having some tie to his past. One late arrival to Burlington is Alvez, who, based on information from Garcia regarding her last tearful visit with Reid in prison, believes he has a way to provide unofficial greater protection to Reid. Alvez, however, is unaware of what Reid is willing to sacrifice for the safety of his friend, Luis Delgado.
Episode 18
Hell's Kitchen
Wed, Mar 29, 201743 mins
Encouraged by Prentiss to visit Reid who has been asking for him, Rossi, who had his own personal reasons for not visiting earlier, stays behind as the rest of the team heads to New York City for their next case. That case is of Katie Hammond, missing now for five days, today her sixteenth birthday. The team is able to tie Katie's abduction back to two cold cases, the murder victim in both those cases and Katie who could be sisters based solely on their physical resemblance. While Katie does have parents who love her and thus has a supportive home life in that respect, the previous victims both led high risk lives, hence the reason their cases went cold. The previous victims were held for one week before they were murdered, their dead bodies posed in a public location, with their bodies having been drained of blood both pre- and post-mortem. Because of the time frame, the team knows they have to work fast as Katie, if still alive, only has a few more days before the unsub will kill her. What does make Katie's case more difficult is that her parents, Bob and Liz Hammond, are divorced, their relationship acrimonious which prevents them from providing a joint front. The team is able to tie Katie's abduction to more and more cold cases reaching as far back as ten years, the similarities, most specifically the geographical locations of the abductions and the time of the day they were abducted and bodies found, may narrow their search in more than one respect. Meanwhile, Reid, who has not been sleeping after Delgado's murder, is able to see more clearly the power hierarchy among the inmates. Based on that and his truncated chat with Rossi, Reid comes to some decisions about how he will conduct himself inside, including how he will deal with the directive to help move the new shipment of drugs or else.
Episode 19
True North
Wed, Apr 5, 201741 mins
Even with the prison on lock-down due to Reid's actions which the prison officials don't yet know were his doing, Prentiss is able to get one of the team to visit with him. Lewis is chosen for a very specific reason, she who is to do another cognitive interview. The hope is that Reid will now be able to remember that Scratch was in the motel room when the murder happened, which if he is able to do, Walker and Prentiss may be able to get Scratch placed on the terrorist watch list if only because he was recently spotted in Latin America, making him now an international fugitive. While Lewis has prison duty and Prentiss is off to London to speak to her Interpol colleagues, the rest of the team head off on their next case, which takes them to the Saguaro Desert east of Tuscon, Arizona, where three dead bodies were found side-by-side, all three perched on poles. The team is able to determine that small boulders were purposefully moved to strategic locations within sight of the victims. The victims are also posed facing true north, as opposed to the "compass" reading of magnetic north. All three victims were wearing shock collars around their neck. The M.E. is able to determine that all three died at different times as the bodies were in different stages of decomposition. All three died from exposure/dehydration, and three half empty water bottles were also found near the site, the initial assumption being the unsub torturing the victims by drinking himself but not giving them any. All three victims are eventually identified, each a recent college graduate in his/her early twenties, all Tuscon natives who had recently returned to give back to the community, and all three who were featured in different media stories about their accomplishments. A fourth victim is eventually discovered, with the same M.O., However, he, Joey Fletcher, does not match the victimology in that he was generally regarded as a slacker who, while attending college, flunked out. Alvez is able to determine the reason for moving the boulders, in that the unsub is counting down his victims. They have to find the tie between Joey and the other three to determine the identity of the unsub and who the ultimate person of his rage is, that person meant to be his fifth and final victim.
Episode 20
Unforgettable
Wed, Apr 26, 201741 mins
Reid's case takes many turns, including his and Lewis' discovery in the cognitive interview that the person in the motel room was not Scratch, but a woman, identifying features about her which he now remembers. This news Lewis is able to pass along to the team to work as a new lead. Another turn is that his trial date has been moved back by six weeks, which Duncan actually sees as a possible blessing in disguise. Reid also receives an unexpected visit in prison, that visit which is bittersweet, but which may have a more direct bearing into his case than he would have imagined. Walker in particular is sidetracked from Reid's case when an old colleague, Sam Bower, the two who worked together undercover in Russia in the BAP, is in hospital on what looks to be a heart attack. However, Walker directly discovers that he was injected with a radioactive toxin which was supposed to mimic a heart attack, the toxin which is now causing internal organ failure. As such, the BAU decides to work this case to assist Walker and his friend. The leading belief within the team is that the attack on Bower is the Russians' doing, despite Bower having been undercover when he was in Moscow, and he long having worked a desk job within the BAP. Garcia is able to find other recent cases of people who were admitted to hospital on heart attacks but who eventually died from internal organ failure, the tie between the cases being that all the victims are federal government employees. As such, the belief becomes that the Russian-styled tactics are meant to obscure the unsub's true motives, which are one of three possibilities: that the unsub is a disgruntled current or former federal government worker; that the unsub is using the attacks to profit by making available an antidote to the toxin; or that the unsub has a personal grudge against only one victim, the other victims being smokescreens. As the BAU works on the case, Walker cannot help but reminisce about his long friendship with Bower, and the parallels in their lives. One divergence is that while Walker is still happily married to Monica, the job in part led to the acrimonious break-up of the Bower marriage, Sam now being estranged from both his ex-wife Lisa and his college student son Zach, who sided with his mother in the situation.
Episode 21
Green Light
Wed, May 3, 201740 mins
A worried Reid informs Prentiss and Duncan about Lindsey Vaughan, who is now holding his mother without she knowing that she is in danger - Lindsey posing as Diana's new nurse, Caroline Atkinson - and is the woman in the motel room in Mexico that killed Rosa Medina. Although Prentiss believes Reid's story especially about Lindsey being Diana's nurse is a figment of his sleep-deprived imagination, she and the team investigate. Most of the team do remember Lindsey and her mob enforcer father Jack Vaughan as being involved in a BAU case about ten years ago, they placed in the witness protection program following, Jack in particular considered too valuable a witness not to face prosecution for his own crimes. In that specific case, Jack killed the unsub on Lindsey's urging in front of Reid. If Reid's story is indeed true, the belief is that Lindsey is working with Scratch. But the most urgent issue is that they have to locate Diana and her real nurse, Cassie Campbell. Regardless, Prentiss and the team know that Reid's position in prison has become more tenuous with Calvin Shaw and the other inmates who Reid poisoned having been released from the infirmary back into the general prison population, meaning that they will now be after Reid. Prentiss and the team go to extreme lengths to protect Reid under his current predicament. The case takes some unexpected twists and turns, two of those being the discovery of Lindsey's connection to Scratch, and the toll the case takes on one of the team members and that person's proposed actions as a result.
Episode 22
Red Light
Wed, May 10, 201743 mins
With J.J. by his side, Reid goes to see Cat Adams in prison, she, in partnership with Lindsey Vaughan, who were the ones who orchestrated everything that happened to him in Mexico, including his incarceration, with Lindsey now holding Diana hostage somewhere unknown. Reid knows that he will go into a psychological game with Cat, much like he did in their previous encounter, with the one big difference which may affect how Reid is able to handle the situation being that Diana's life is on the line. The rest of the team remains at headquarters, where they have to figure out the connection between Cat and Lindsey: what brought them together as partners in this venture, how they have been able to communicate with each other with Cat in solitary confinement in prison, and how Cat in particular seems to know as much as she does about Reid's personal life. Prentiss decides to use a controversial and less than ethical approach to advance the case, most specifically in locating Lindsey and a hopefully still alive Diana. Meanwhile, an old friend of the BAU returns with some disturbing news, but news that may assist in dealing with one of their long time nemeses.
