Reviews @ PXDCO

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood Koreatown. That is, until the bullets start flying. The neighbors scream and scatter or hit the ground, all except one old woman who freezes while watering her lawn and one little boy, blood spattered on his face, who stands silently in the middle of the chaos.

While the cops, stymied by the language barrier, try to question the crowd, Grissom, Riley and SuperDave examine the two victims, a male and a female. There's no ID on the female but the male is identified as Sung Bang, who was released from prison earlier that day. Grissom finds a pair of child's sunglasses on the ground and they're covered in blood drops, indicating the kid witnessed the whole thing. Whether the kid ran or was taken, Grissom says they need to find him before something happens to him.

Down at the station, the police question and examine everyone at the party, which basically amounts to all of Koreatown. It's a little hectic, especially since it looks like Ando from Heroes is the only translator. Greg finds blood on one young man's shirt but he's uncooperative when Brass tries to question him. In the morgue, Doc Robbins confirms both victims died from gunshot wounds, made from two guns. The bullets in Bang went in straight but the ones in the female victim entered at an upward angle. Also, she's got needle marks between her toes and Grissom thinks what they know about her - drug addict, no ID, with an ex-con - points to her being a prostitute. She also had plastic surgery on her eyelids and Brass tracks down the doctor who performed the surgery at gunpoint, under orders from her pimp. The doctor says the pimp and his buddies also forced him to turn over a percentage of his profits and reluctantly says they belong to a gang called the KD ("something" Dragons; I don't know, my closed-captioning isn't working). They prefer extortion as their crime of choice and like to keep a low profile, so once the doctor installed security cameras at his practice they never hassled him again. Detective Cavaliere interrupts to let Brass know that a surveillance hit came in. Brass is puzzled since the CSIs said there were no cameras at the scene, but Cavaliere says it didn't come from CSI.

Dempsey's store. The manager takes Catherine and Brass back into their surveillance room, which is almost tricked out better than the CSI lab. The manager brags about how much the theft rate has dropped while Catherine and Brass boggle at the high-tech set-up. Catherine asks the A/V tech Artie (clever!) to show her the tape and she sees Sung Bang walking down an aisle with a little boy, possibly the missing kid. Catherine spots a toy in the kid's hands and asks Mindy the fingerprint tech (okay, now it's just twee) to see it. She compares a print on the toy with one she lifted from the sunglasses and they're a match. Bang was with their missing kid shortly before he and the female victim ended up dead.

A CPS representative, Bae Chin, is able to identify the kid as Park Bang, Sung Bang's nephew. She's also able to identify the female victim as Kora Sil, Park's mother. Kora was HIV positive and passed it on to Park, who needs to be found soon because he's on a strict drug regimen. Chin says Sung was the one who called CPS to look after Park when he learned of Kora's drug use, and that he really loved his nephew. Later, Catherine runs Kora's record and learns she served quite a bit of time for prostitution, more than would normally be served because of her HIV status.

By tracking her internet usage, Archie and Greg find a likely last known address for Kora and Park but the owner, Jin Ming, a respectable-looking businessman expresses confusion as to why Park would be there. He says he knew Kora and Park and let them use his computer sometimes because he was friends with Park's deceased father, but insists they didn't live with him and he doesn't know where Park is. He also says he hadn't heard of Kora's death because he was away on a business trip. Officer Ando tells Brass that he didn't find anything in the house and the cops leave, with Brass requesting that Ming call if he hears anything.

Nicky rounds up the cavalry, including a very reluctant Hodges, to go through the Koreatown neighborhood looking for the stuff Sung bought at Dempsey's. Everyone fans out and Hodges heads over to one trash can, lifts the lid and looks inside, then closes it and just stands there. Nicky, exasperated, says he knows Hodges hates field work but asks him to help out anyway. Hodges beckons him over and lifts the lid again, showing Nicky a Dempsey's bag inside that contains the stuff on Sung's receipt. "Can I go now?" Hodges whines. Hee! Nicky's irritated expression is cracking me up so hard.

Nicky and Riley go to the house nearest the trashcan but get a gun pulled on them by the old lady inside. The old lady screams in Korean, Riley screams back, and Nicky is all, "Oh, for fuck's sake, will both of y'all just CHILLAX?" Before the guns start blazing, little Park Bang steps out from his hiding place and says something in Korean, probably along the lines of, "I agree with the angry Texan. CHILLAX."

Grissom meets Riley at the hospital and learns that 1) Park won't say anything about the shootings and 2) Riley questioned him without the CPS advocate present. The latter pisses off Grissom and he essentially tells her to get the fuck out, which she does, but in the brattiest, flounciest way ever. I kind of hate her again, mostly because she's been shoved down my throat this episode. When she leaves, Grissom enters Park's room, where he's being examined by a doctor. Park has a feeding tube and lesions all over his skin, which the doctor says could be side effects from his drug regimen.

Back at the station, Nicky questions Mrs. Lee, with Officer Ando's help. She says she heard the shots but didn't see what happened. She found Park near her house and took him in to protect him. When Nicky says she should've turned him over to CPS, she isn't convinced that Park would've been better off.

Later at the hospital, Brass is trying to get Park to look at mugshots but he's not having any luck. Brass decides to take a break but Grissom stays behind to collect evidence. He tells Park that he needs to scrape under Park's nails and promises that it won't hurt and he won't grab Park's hand, only wait for Park to hold it out. Slowly, Park holds out his hand and lets Grissom collect the evidence. While he's working, a doctor barges in and brusquely starts to inject meds into Park's gastric tube. Park cries and twists away but the doctor, who is clearly an epic asshole, just ignores his distress. Grissom looks upset and troubled by the so-called "medical care" Park is being given.

At the lab, Henry brings Park's tox panel to Grissom and confirms that Grissom already suspected: the drugs Park is being given are doing terrible damage to him and some are even still in trials. Grissom wonders how a drug addict's kid ended up in a drug trial. In the DNA lab, Wendy tests the fingernail scrapings and when the results come in, she tells Greg that the skin belongs to Jin Ming, who has a youthful record as a street racer. Even worse, it was skin from the butt and it looks like Park was molested along with all the other tragedies he's had to deal with, but Wendy spots the tattoos Ming has in his mugshot, which he doesn't have now. She thinks he got skin grafts to hide them and they speculate that Ming is a member of the KDs, which like to keep a low profile.

The cops return to Ming's house and it's been completely emptied out, except for the basement, which is where Kora and Park were living. Greg and Cavaliere look around and Cavaliere picks up a photo showing Ming with Kora and Park but as he lifts it, it pulls a string. Cavaliere yells at Greg to duck just as an explosion goes off. Well, "explosion." My cat unleashes farts that are more explosive than that.

Well, fuck. Okay y'all, here's the deal. My area has been under storm and tornado watches all day and we've got another round coming through, so I'm going to give the super-rushed version of the last 15 minutes because I don't want this recap to be late. I promise I'll make it up to you with the next recap. Anyway, here's what went down. Sung came home from prison and was delighted to see his nephew, but not so happy to learn that Kora was basically selling her son's health for the few bucks a week she got for getting him in the drug trial. Sung was furious and left with Park, despite both Kora and Ming trying to stop them. Unfortunately, Kora was really pissed off at the idea that Sung might take away one of her meal tickets and when Sung and Park returned from Dempsey's, she shot Sung right in the middle of the street party. Traumatized and upset at seeing the only person who ever gave a damn shot right in front of him, Park took Sung's gun and shot his mother.

Park will end up going to juvie, which is all kinds of bullshit since a really good case could be made for self-defense, but whatever. Also, Grissom chased away the opportunistic doctor who's been drugging up Park on behalf of the pharmaceutical companies. In fact, Grissom got seriously angry and, not going to lie, it was more than a little hot. Even though Park is free of his toxic mother and even more toxic drug regimen, Grissom confesses to Brass that he wishes he'd never solved the case. Brass recognizes that for the monumental statement it is, considering this is Gil "the evidence is all that matters" Grissom, and we're all left wondering which direction Grissom's meltdown will head next.

I'm sure Natalie Davis, aka the miniature crime scene killer, will shed some light on that next week.