The Memories in the Shallow Grave





Episode Summary





Megaselia scalaris, better known as coffin flies, which means she's been dead about a week. Brennan thinks that the woman was killed by sharp trauma from a weapon that went through her mouth and into her brain. Back at the lab, Wendell and Saroyan further inspect the victim's soft tissue for evidence of trauma, and Hodgins finds beetles in the brain that may have eaten particulates on the weapon, which was likely sharp and metal. A group of paintball players stumbles on a dead body eroding out of a shallow grave. The team is called to the scene, and Brennan notices from the pelvis that the deceased was a female in her late 20s or early 30s. Hodgins finds, better known as coffin flies, which means she's been dead about a week. Brennan thinks that the woman was killed by sharp trauma from a weapon that went through her mouth and into her brain. Back at the lab, Wendell and Saroyan further inspect the victim's soft tissue for evidence of trauma, and Hodgins finds beetles in the brain that may have eaten particulates on the weapon, which was likely sharp and metal.





Before defleshing the body, Brennan and Wendell scope out the other trauma to the victim: blunt force injuries that occurred to the clavicle, acromion process of the scapula, and frontal bone about 6 months ago, based on the state of remodelling. Hodgins discovers that the victim was lying in linseed oil and reveals that the beetles show she had been taking Lorazepam , an anti-anxiety medication. Angela's quick facial reconstruction gets a hit in the missing persons database: Claire Sorrano, whose husband filed a report 6 months ago and then a couple weeks ago.





In talking to the husband, Sweets and Booth learn that Claire had amnesia and was in a fugue state , a dissociative disorder that can last for months, after which the person recovers earlier memories but generally does not remember what happened in the fugue state. The victim's husband also reveals that she was being treated by Dr. David Yasrik, a specialist in neurocognitive disorders. Yasrik tells Sweets and Booth that another patient, Trevor Kwan, was obsessed with Claire, since he'd lost his wife in a plane crash and suffered from aphasia . Booth discovers linseed oil in Kwan's violin case, and Hodgins determines that something made of canvas was removed from the grave before Claire was buried, but there is no evidence to tie Kwan to the crime. Kwan suspects the victim's husband. Charges of abuse filed by Claire against her husband appear damning at first, but because of her amnesia, she would get confused and attack her husband, thinking he was a stranger.





At the Jeffersonian, Brennan shows Saroyan the spiderweb fractures on Claire's frontal bone and notes discoloration along the seam of the fracture. The injury was actually perimortem, on top of an old head injury, so the particulates in the wound could help them identify the murder weapon or the murderer. Wendell re-xrays all the bones and notices a bullet fragment lodged in a long bone. Claire was shot, but the injury was not life threatening and happened about 4 months ago. Saroyan suggests that the bullet was not fully removed by a non-specialist, leading the team to think that Claire may have been on the run from the law during her fugue state. The striations on the bullet help Angela find the gun that fired it. The gun belonged to a homeowner who found a man and a woman breaking into his home in WV. The cops arrested the man, Ricky Duvall, who ended up in a halfway house. Meanwhile, the particulates from the perimortem trauma to Claire's skull reveal a special kind of paint manufactured in Germany for the German military. Hodgins suspects the murder weapon was a field spade whose other end is a 175mm saw blade.





Booth goes to visit Ricky Duvall, who knew Claire as Brenda and encouraged her to rob the house in WV with him. He also told her about his secret stash of money in Hamilton State Park - $80,000 in a canvas sack. Sweets and Booth pore through Dr. Yasrik's records of Claire's treatment and notice that he has no notes about her fugue state. He's also jotted down codes related to gambling, leading Booth to suspect that Yasrik may have found out about the cash and killed Claire. Although Yasrik's bank account does seem to turn over quite often, suggesting he had a gambling problem, there is no solid evidence to tie him to the murder. Brennan thinks it's important to xray the paintball splatters at the crime scene and finds what she's looking for: a piece of gum underneath the splatter. The impression of the teeth in the gum match the dental records of Dr. Yasrik. Booth arrests him, and Yasrik admits that he did so much for Claire, she owed him that money.





On the drama side of things, Booth and Brennan are splitting their time at one another's houses. This produces tension, which is not helped by Brennan's pointing out that she makes a lot more money than Booth. By the end of the episode, after a lot of pregancy-related talk about emotions and hormones, Brennan and Booth decide to get a new place together and start a family. Generally, I'm cynical about these sorts of sap-fest plots, but there's just something endearing about two damaged people coming together and trying to make a better life for their child. Aaaaand now I sound like a Hallmark card. Onward!





Forensic Comments

Overall, a solid episode. The age/sex estimation is reasonable, the team did good work identifying all the blunt trauma, they reasoned out the type of weapon that would have been used to make the injuries, and they figured out time of death and pertinent information about the victim through entomology.

I wasn't so happy with the hand-waving about "particulates," which is always a bit lazy of a convention on the part of the writers. Also, why would there have been "particulates" in a perimortem wound on a skeleton that had already been fully defleshed? Did they deflesh it by boiling? Using dermastid beetles?

I'm surprised that the team couldn't tell from the soft tissue and bone that the murder weapon was serrated. It should leave different marks on both the tissue and bone than a non-serrated blade would.

The gum in the paintball is a little silly. Why would a murderer leave behind gum with possible DNA and dental indentation in it? This man is a doctor, he's not dumb. And is a partial dental impression really enough to convict a person?

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