Dead Issue (Hrs)

Mörderische Eifersucht

Week starting June 7th, 1992

Lionel E. Siegel

Mitch Gabourie & Niclolas J. Gray

Lori Hallier as Lynn Fiori & Marc Strange as Inspector Anthony Fiore

A beautiful young blonde meets a scruffy young stud in a bar and they go to her apartment. As they pantingly begin to undress, she asks for him to put on a video and tosses him a tape that, from the label, is obviously a porno movie. He tells her he has something better than the video and slowly begins to strangle her. She's frightened but he explains that his friend told him about this, how cutting off the oxygen to the brain enhances the sexual pleasure. But she is still very afraid and fights him off. He continues to try and get his hands around her throat when she takes a gun from her purse and pulls the trigger.

At the crime scene, Nick, Schanke and Stonetree discuss the situation. They all know the woman is Inspector Fiori's wife, Lynn. She has told Stonetree that a strange man broke in and attacked her and she shot him in self-defense. Schanke says he called her husband at their country house but he wasn't home.

Back at headquarters, we learn that Stonetree is good friends with both of the Fioris. He is very upset about what happened to Lynn and even more upset when Nick tells him that there are a lot of things that just don't add up, the first being, "Immediately after being choked, how was she able to fire two shots directly into his heart?" Stonetree explains that Lynn was an expert shot. He's been with them on the Police Range and she never misses. Nick tries to point out other inconsistencies in her story but Stonetree becomes increasingly adamant that Nick just drop it.

After all the cops have watched the porno video found at the scene, Nick takes it to the video store it was rented from to see who rented it. The store owner doesn't want to tell him, so Nick gives him a very gentle hypnotic nudge and the man immediately says, "It was a Mrs. Fiori who rented it."

Stonetree visits the Fioris at their country home and we finally meet the Inspector. He is a bald man, who looks more than old enough to be Lynn's father. Stonetree suggests that he take Lynn on a long vacation to some warm exotic place until all the publicity on this dies down.

Nick meets up with Schanke outside the video store and a passing patrolman stops and reports to Nick that the dead man has been identified as Charlie Gubbins, who has a long record. He also says that a neighbor in the Fioris apartment building has seen Charlie there on several occasions, apparently as a welcome and invited guest. Schanke begs Nick to stop all this investigating as Stonetree ordered, but Nick knows a rat when he smells one and refuses to give up. He insists Schanke help him by getting a warrant for the records of the video store. Schanke agrees to do it as long as Nick promises he won't approach the Fioris personally in any way. Nick evades having to make this promise.

Thinking they are alone and unobserved in the bedroom of their country home, unaware that Nick is standing silently outside their window, the Fioris talk. We learn that he knows she has a huge appetite for kinky sex and has many lovers, and he doesn't mind if only she'd let him know what she was doing and would stay out of trouble. She tells him she knows she isn't worthy of him and wishes he didn't love her because she doesn't deserve his love. He tells her he can't help it, he still loves her anyway.

Nick returns to the apartment and finds two bullets in one of the stereo speakers. He then returns to headquarters and finds Nat and Schanke waiting for him. Schanke tells him he couldn't get the warrant for the video store records. Everyone he went to for it told him to forget it, the case is closed, it is a "Dead Issue". Nat and Schanke beg Nick to stop his investigation and not tell anyone what he has found. He goes to Stonetree's office anyway and submits his written report telling all he knows about Charlie Gubbins being a welcome guest, right up through the bullets he's found and all their implications. Stonetree is furious but Lynn is brought in and a taped statement is being taken. She now admits she did invite Charlie in but when he started choking her she had no choice but to shoot him.

Later at the loft, Nat asks Nick, "So what's changed? She admits she knew the guy but she still shot him in self-defense." Nick tells Nat, "What's changed is that now I know she didn't pull the trigger." The bullets he found were fired by a person taller than Lynn. There was definitely another shooter in the room. He tells Nat how he overheard a conversation between Lynn and her husband and Lynn is heaping all the blame upon herself. Nat interrupts him, suddenly remembering that she forgot to give him his veggie drink. Nick gets down a single swallow without grimacing but tells her, "It's like poison."

At the Raven, Nick asks Janette what she knows about Charlie. She tells him about Charlie's sleazy friend, Morgan, who just happens to be in the club now. Morgan turns out to be the owner of the video store the porno movie came from! Nick kisses Janette and hauls Morgan down to headquarters for questioning.

Knowing there is a photo in Stontree's office of Stonetree with both Fioris, Schanke sneaks in to get it to show it to Morgan, to see if he can identify either of the Fioris. Stonetree catches him stealing the photo, but then allows him to show it to Morgan. Does he hope to exonerate the Fioris by allowing this? Does he really want to know the truth? Maybe both?

Nick visits Lynn at the country house. She won't talk with him. Meanwhile, at headquarters, Morgan is confessing all he knows about the situation. He identifies Inspector Fiori from the group photo as the one who came to his store and told him to say that Lynn found the tape and was merely going to return it to him, that she was not the one who rented it. Stonetree then goes to see the Fioris. The Inspector isn't there at the moment but Lynn tells him that she killed Charlie when she first brought him to the apartment. It was all her fault. But now Stonetree knows she wasn't the one who actually killed Charlie. Lynn leaves and the Inspector comes in. Stonetree tells him, "I know you killed Charlie Gubbins." Fiori, now past all rationality, kidnaps Stonetree, thinking if he does away with his old friend, all this mess can be covered up and forgotten.

Lynn tells Nick and Schanke where she thinks her husband has taken Stonetree. Nick arrives first and finds Lynn's guess was correct. In an abandoned warehouse, Fiori has Stonetree tied to a chair. He tells Stonetree he knew Lynn was seeing Charlie but he knew Charlie was going to hurt her or worse yet, take her away from him. He is about to shoot Stonetree when Nick jumps in. Fiori backs off and Nick unties Stonetree. Nick is about to go after Fiori but Stonetree tells Nick that he wants to arrest Fiori himself. Stonetree finds Fiori in the warehouse but Fiori shoots him in the shoulder. Nick subdues Fiori and calls the paramedics for Stonetree. Reinforcements arrive and Fiori is carted off to jail.

Epilogue
Nat calls Nick at the loft, from the Police Picnic, telling him everyone is asking for him and since it is almost sunset, he agrees to come over to the park. Schanke proudly announces to Nick when Nick arrives that "The Schanke Scorchers" baseball team has won the game! Nat and Nick talk with Stonetree about the upcoming Fiori trial and how both Fioris are holding up fairly well. Stonetree goes off to check on his wife and Nick gives Nat a quick kiss... IN PUBLIC!!

In the early European Renaissance - somewhere between 1300-1600... Nick is posing nude for a painter with a pretty and young girl named Ilsa. (Don't rush to view the scene! They are behind a curtain and, alas, we can only see their heads and bare shoulders!) During a break she asks Nick to strangle her. Surprised, Nick asks her what crime could she have possibly committed that would make her seek death? She tells him that she seduced a nobleman. She didn't intend to but no matter how demurely she acts men just seem to be constantly seduced by her.

The artist later tells Nick, "She puts up strenuous resistance," but with a little effort he knows Nick can succeed!

Nick asks her later if she resisted the nobleman and she says she did. Nick tells her she did not seduce the nobleman, she was raped by him and she should feel no guilt, she did nothing wrong. The nobleman is the guilty one. Ilsa insists she has to be evil to provoke such thoughts in men, no matter how unintentionally and she asks Nick again to kill her, otherwise she will kill herself.

Some time later, Nick goes to see her to tell her that he found the man who raped her, and it is implied that Nick "took care of him", but he is too late. She has taken poison and is dead. The artist picks up the goblet she drank the poison from and sniffs it. He tells Nick, "It's called Lady Killer. It's most popular with the ladies because it's the cheapest."

Lacroix does not appear in this episode at all... he is still possibly being presumed dead, having been killed by Nick in an earlier episode? There is a short scene with Janette where Nick kisses her. In the epilogue scene he also kisses Nat... a rare occurrence, seeing Nick kiss BOTH his ladies in one episode! Also, something to note in this episode, the hypnotic nudge Nick gives the video store clerk is much shorter than any I can remember him giving anyone. We have met people who are so hard to hypnotize they are almost true resistors, but this guy was such an easy pushover that you could almost miss the whole thing!

FoDs	Lots of insight into Stonetree's character. He is extremely loyal to his friends.
NatPackers	Nick kisses Nat in public at the Police Picnic in the epilogue scene.
Immortal Beloveds	Janette is once again very tolerant of Nick's long absences and when he finally does go to see her, it's for information on some seedy person involved in one of his cases. But she forgives him once again and gives him a great lead and he kisses her too.

Schanke & Nick:	Schanke: "He looks familiar." Nick: "You always say that, Schanke. And guess what? You're usually wrong."
Schanke & Nick:	Schanke, when proven right: "Let me hear the words..." Nick, with a big sigh: "You were right... I was wrong."
Schanke	(on the porno video) "On a scale of one to ten, I give it a thirteen."

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