Criminal Minds

Seriously, this is beyond gross.

Who leaves dirty dishes in the sink?

I know we bought this house as it,

but come on.

I don't think this wall is load-bearing, hon.

We can knock it out, build the baby's nursery in this direction.

I guess.

Hey, what's the matter?

You sure we did the right thing?

Buying this place, I mean.

It's kind of creepy.

We wanted a place to make our own, remember?

Come on, babe.

We're going to be happy here.

I promise.

I hope you're right.

What the hell?

There a Hazmat suit anywhere around here?

Ben?

You ok?

Aah!

I'm sorry I'm late.

Never live where your commute involves a bridge.

It's ok. I was just going through potential cases.

Hey, I meant it when I said you should take some time off.

You've just been through a lot.

That's like the job description

of everybody who works here.

"Must go through a lot." I'm ok.

That just came in.

A mummy?

Yeah, they found it inside of a wall

in a cabin outside varnville, south Carolina.

They think it's really old.

Well, it's not something you see every day,

but it sounds more like a cold case.

That's a no then.

Hey, wait a second.

Rossi's still in Savannah, isn't he?

Uh-huh. He comes back today.

And how far is varnville from the main highway?

Not far, like 10 miles.

Ok. Well, maybe he can swing by on his way out,

take a look, advise local law enforcement

on how to proceed.

No problem, Emily.

I was just getting ready to check out.

David, before you drop me...

shh, shh, shh.

Uh, yeah, have Garcia send me the contact information

and I'll coordinate from the road.

I'll check in when I get there.

Ok.

Did you just shush me?

I'm sorry. That was Emily.

Oh. Yeah, you don't want your boss to know

you have a woman in a hotel room.

What I don't want is the whole team weighing in just yet.

They tend to have a proprietary interest

in my love life.

Mm-hmm. Oh.

Shh.

Portia.

Uh, yeah, I'm leaving for the airport now.

Savannah is lovely.

Lot of work, but I managed to squeeze in a little bit of fun.

Yes.

I'll call you when I land at jfk.

Bye.

So you don't want your daughter to know

you have a man in your hotel room.

David rossi is a touchy subject right now.

Why?

Well, the last time the 3 of us were together,

you lobbed a grenade into her wedding plans.

She was about to marry an abusive con man.

Ok, a grenade that needed to be lobbed.

I know that and she knows that.

But the wounds are a little fresh right now, that's all.

Which means she doesn't appreciate you sleeping with the enemy.

Stop it.

She doesn't think that you're the enemy.

Mmm.

She just met a new guy,

the first one that she's been interested in

since the breakup.

That's great.

So maybe just for a little bit,

we keep this on the downlow.

I appreciate the help, agent rossi.

Nobody's touched a thing, like you asked.

Is the coroner en route from Charleston yet?

They should be here any minute.

The cadaver dog just arrived.

Get to work. Let's go.

Who were the previous owners?

That'd be Karl and Dorothy Elgin.

Hermits.

Built the place back in the sixties

and just holed up.

They still around?

Oh, Karl died a couple of years ago,

and Dorothy's been put in a nursing home.

From what I hear, she's pretty much lost her marbles.

Can't imagine who the body could be.

I mean, nobody's been reported missing

around these parts that I can remember.

Dog looks like it's confused.

The dog's not confused, it's overwhelmed.

Captioning made possible by abc studios, llc, and CBS, inc.

"Memory is a crazy woman

that hoards colored rags and throws away food."

Austin O'Malley.

So as far as anyone knows,

Karl and Dorothy Elgin lived totally isolated.

No kids, no family, no friends.

50 years. I mean, they had to have

some interaction with other people.

5 bodies and counting, all young females.

Coroner says the victims have been there for a while.

Are we looking at a husband and wife killing team here?

It's rare, but it does happen.

In england, Rosemary west assisted her husband Fred

in the murder of 12 individuals

over a 20-year span without detection.

Dorothy Elgin could be a homegrown version of that...

female accommodating the psychopathic urges of the man.

Ok, but why mummify?

Forensic countermeasure, maybe?

Hmm. Throwing the bodies in a swamp would have been

a better forensic countermeasure.

Luke's right. It was a deliberate choice

to preserve those corpses,

keep the victims close to home.

You know, maybe the killer thought

he was sending the bodies into the future.

Ancient Egyptians believed the souls of the deceased

would return from the afterlife

to re-inhabit their original bodies,

so the human form was kept in tact and recognizable.

There's also a literal covering up of the crime here,

and that says remorse.

Matt, jj, go to the local sheriff's department,

help them prepare for the media frenzy

that's coming down the pike.

Luke, you and I will meet rossi at the crime scene.

Reid, Tara, go to the nursing home,

see if you can talk to Dorothy Elgin.

If anyone knows the secrets of that house, it's her.

Mrs. Elgin was committed here 3 months ago.

She was found wandering on the outskirts of town

in the middle of the night.

And the diagnosis was dementia?

That's right.

Honestly, I don't know how much luck

y'all are gonna have talking to her.

Mrs. Elgin drifts in and out.

Did she bring any personal possessions with her?

She had a bag with some small items

when the police found her.

I believe they're still in her room

if you want to take a look.

What about visitors?

Not a one. It's sad, really.

Mrs. Elgin, there's some people here to see you.

Dorothy, hi. I'm Tara.

This is my friend Reid.

We were hoping to maybe talk to you

about your old house.

We think something bad happened there.

Maybe with your help,

we could fix it.

Good. You found it ok.

How many victims are we up to?

7, in the walls and under the floor.

They found this box filled with knickknacks

next to one of the bodies.

Souvenirs of their victims.

We should get descriptions of these items

out to the public.

It might jog someone's memory.

Dr. Caldwell, this is ssa prentiss and ssa alvez.

Dr. Caldwell's with the Charleston coroner's office.

She came up to help us out.

Yeah, local m.E.'S not equipped

to handle something like this,

so I'm having the remains taken back to our facilities.

Do we know how long the bodies have been here?

Ballpark, 20 years. Some longer, some shorter.

This all seems fairly sophisticated.

It is.

The internal organs weren't removed

as with a true mummification,

but the bodies were treated before being wrapped

and then salted.

That's why there's no discernible odor.

Those look like the teeth of a meth addict.

These women probably all lived high-risk lifestyles...

drug addicts, prostitutes, runaways.

Explains why they might vanish for decades