Numb3rs s04e13 Episode Script
Black Swan
Insert, let's go, let's go.
The first thing I tell you ba is probably the most important thing you'll hear today.
If you take nothing else away from this seminar- and you better take a lot more away from this seminar- I'll tell you that teaching is not about what you know.
It's about how you lead.
And of course, you are all leaders here.
Hit it! Hit it! marching your students along a path to illumination and intellectual independence, and that's a path known only to yourselves.
Which means, you better have a plan every single day.
There are days when you're going to feel intimidated, especially at the beginning.
You know, you'll feel like you're losing control.
On your knees! On your knees! That's why we're here- to be your support system, to back you up.
Don't move! Get 'em up! David, how we doing back there? Clear in front, Don.
All right, let's lock this place up, guys! Let's go! Lock it up tight! You know, in teaching, as well as in science, there is a place for your instincts, so learn to listen to them, learn to understand what they're telling you.
Are we missing anyone? Negative.
All 11 are under.
Frequently, intuition is simply your rational mind finding an ineloquent way of talking to you.
Hey, Colby, that guy in the red flannel shirt that SWAT just turned around? Yeah, Don, he was parking when we pulled up.
Bravo team says he checks out.
You know what? Pull that guy back.
I want to talk to him.
All right, 10-4.
Ultimately, the hallmark of any good teacher, of any good leader, is his belief in himself.
You know, with that belief comes the confidence of others.
Of course, it doesn't hurt being right.
Hey, hold up for a second.
Yeah, we got a runner going east on Sixth! So, uh, any questions? Wow.
That was strange.
Yeah.
and not a single question.
The silence was memorable.
Hmm.
And this from someone who lives in a monastery.
You know, I've done countless T.
A.
orientations.
That was a first.
It's funny how the most routine jobs can still surprise you.
Now we know why he ran- guns, cuffs, duct tape.
What tipped you off? I don't know.
Something about him.
Okay, this guy- he cruises a meth lab, right? He's got a kidnapper's shopping list in the back of his van.
Yeah, so, whatever he was up to, it's definitely not alone.
You get the feeling we're looking at the tip of a whole other iceberg? Duct tape, plastic handcuffs.
Those are cable ties, purchased legally at a hardware store.
I have the receipt.
Soundproofing insulation? Which is why I bought the duct tape.
Three handguns? Legitimately possessed, in accordance with all federal and local requirements.
Cruising around a meth lab.
I didn't know anything about a lab.
I was lost.
I asked the cops for directions to the freeway.
Then why'd you run? Illinois v.
Wardlow allows the police to stop anyone for the simple act of running.
It does not constitute grounds for arrest.
Yeah, well, we're not the police.
We're the Feds.
There's different rules, and a whole different set of problems for you.
You know, and having a smart answer to every question- it's not going to change the facts.
You were cruising that meth lab.
Played it cool when SWAT stopped you, but when my partner here took a second look, and you knew we were going to check inside your van- I just think you lost your spine.
Illinois v.
Wardlow I guess you didn't want us to find your legally-purchased duct tape and your insulation and your handcuffs and your guns.
You can't prove anything.
Oh, I think we will.
And while that's happening, you're just going to sit here and think about every mistake you made, and how easy it's going to be for us to find them.
Because when we find those mistakes, any chance you have of coming clean and making a deal goes away, and so do you.
Isaac Meechum came from Helena, Montana five months ago, or at least, that's when he changed over his license.
No rap sheet? Not even a speeding ticket, but if you're going to send out a guy to go buy ammunition, guns and ducttape We found registered purchases for 15 rifles and pistols.
That's including the three we already recovered.
Which makes sense.
If you're going to hit a meth lab, you're going to need some serious firepower and some partners.
All right, so where are the rest of them? That's a good question.
LAPD tossed this guy's apartment, but not only weren't there any guns, super says he hadn't seen the guy in a couple of weeks.
So, what, we got, a stash house? Well, Intelligence Unit did have something.
They have a connection to a Montana group called The New America Front.
Those guys are pro-gun, anti-government, anti-tax, and you can pretty much guess why Meechum didn't make eye contact with me once.
Their leaders were arrested last year for planning to bomb an IRS collection center, and the rest of them scattered, so, we might be looking at, like, a splinter group, trying to fund a new attack.
Well, good.
Then we'll hold him as a domestic terror suspect.
This is just a theory.
So what? We don't want him getting to a phone before we find out if there's a stash house or where the rest of the people are, right? That's arbitrary suppression of due process.
If that's what it takes, fine.
You know, we also, uh, found one of those portable GPS navigation devices in Meechum's van.
Which also makes sense if you're new to L.
A.
Did you check the addresses on it? It's mostly restaurants, bars, some hardware stores, but, look, I was thinking.
If his partners don't know we nabbed this guy, yet, right- they're going to start wondering where he is, so, maybe we drop the van at the last bar Meechum went to.
Maybe we get lucky.
They find the van.
We find the partners? It's a pretty basic GPS with no data on times or routes.
Just the ten most recent destinations he typed in.
Right, which gives us 11 points, including the meth lab.
So, I see a map with a bunch of dots on it.
I figure you can tell me something.
Maybe even find the stash house.
Oh, you know, there's not enough data here for any kind of inference.
Uh, maybe some application of Floyd-Warshall? Hmm.
Wouldn't the process of comparing all potential routes between each set of points require a lot of brute force? That's just not an expression I would normally associate with, uh Well, anyway.
Yeah.
Understood.
Well, we know the order that the locations were arrived at, so, what about doing a time series analysis of overlapping Dirichlet tessellations? Wow.
Mm-hmm.
See, each location is a place that Meechum couldn't find without his GPS, so we can assume that he's unfamiliar with the other streets in the area, as well.
From there, we build out.
Like driving a stake into a frozen river.
We can watch the cracks grow.
The more stakes we drive, the more cracks we can analyze.
And the pattern will present itself.
Yeah, but what kind of pattern? That's the best part.
We won't know until we do it.
Heady stuff, Charles.
I smell a paper here, at the very least.
Yeah.
We'll need Amita, and dry erase boards.
Lots of dry erase boards.
Hey, Amita.
Hey, Alan.
Um, you know, I think Charlie's still in his classroom, but here.
Whoa.
What are we looking for? Uh, nothing.
We are tidying up, because my parents are finally coming on Tuesday after canceling on me twice.
Oh, and what does that got to do with Charlie's office? Um Absolutely nothing.
Just lots of nervous energy.
Yeah, well, a little excitement under the circumstances is quite understandable.
Yeah, it's been a year since they went back to India, and, um, every time they come to town, we have a tradition.
We take a hike through Elysian Park, and then, we go to Roscoe's for waffles.
Waffles? Yes.
Waffles.
You know, when I was little, we each made a list of our five favorite foods, and waffles was the only thing that made it on each of our lists.
Oh.
And honestly, I think my dad just put it on ere because he knew how much I loved them.
Oh.
Sorry.
That's my mom.
Probably texting me the flight info.
What? Bad news? Well, they-they, um they have to postpone again.
Oh.
Uh, an emergency meeting with the Ministry of Finance.
Yeah, well, I'm sure they're just as disappointed as you are.
Yeah, I'm sure they are.
Here, sorry.
Let me take these.
Oh, thanks.
I'm sorry.
Uh Did I tell you about the dog? That's the one that followed you home from jogging.
Then the owner saw you, he called the cops, and he accused you of dognapping.
Yeah.
About two hours ago.
Right.
Hey, guess who called me, man, after you said she was never going to do it.
Yeah, you told me.
Well, I guess that's it.
We've, uh, officially run out of stuff to talk about.
Okay.
All right, 20 bucks says we get a bite before midnight.
All right, how do you define a bite? Looking in the window, trying the door? Well, not a window, definitely a door.
Door's a bite.
Double or nothing on the Le Mans.
What do you mean double or nothing, man? I was just betting on the bite.
All right, they're going inside to see if Meechum's passed out on the bar.
Checking the bathroom.
Now he's wondering what the hell happened.
Ten more minutes and I would have made 20 bucks.
Right in front of us? They find the hardware but no guns.
What are they thinking? They're thinking Meechum got halfway through his shopping list, fell into the gin mill, got dragged ho by some girl.
I've been to plenty of gin mills in my day, man.
Who are these women that just drag you home and where do I find them? You, my friend, are a prisoner of high standards and low social skills.
* * Looks like we found the stash house.
Now we just have to figure out what the hell's going on inside.
Thank you, soft real estate market.
We like? We like.
Hey, heads up.
Yeah, I know that they're busy and that their work is very important, but Consulting on the national finances of the second-largest population on the planet but if you're angry, so am I, within whatever acceptable boundaries won't come back to haunt me later.
It's not that I'm mad, it's just- I mean, do you know what it feels like to not see your family for a really long time? That hasn't been a problem for me for quite a while.
Well, I don't know, I mean, lately my parents just feel like a pair of voices, and I feel disconnected, like a piece of who I am is starting to blur.
Well, you are connected, and they will come eventually.
Uh Hey, guys, bad time? You kidding? Last week I walked in on them and they were Thanks, Dad.
Uh, what brings you here so late? Well, I wasn't gonna wake you up, but I was actually driving by and I saw the lights were on, so Maybe I should make a cup of coffee for somebody here? Not for me; I need to grab a few hours shut-eye.
Well, we already factored the house into our computations.
It's really moving the work along.
Moving it to what, exactly? Uncharted territory.
The Dirichlet tessellations have something to tell us.
I know it every time I look at this map, even if I don't know what.
That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about.
What if they're using three different vehicles? I mean, can we factor in situations where they would use one but not the other two? We like a mathematician.
inking He's definitely starting to sound like one.
Facial recognition software gives subject one a 95% match and subject two a 93% match.
I have no doubt it's the same guy.
Joshua Quigley has an arrest for assault, possession of unregistered weapons, tax evasion.
Bernard Laiken- assault, possession of unregistered weapons.
Am Both in The New America Front.
You know, the subject house was rented by Meechum.
Meechum's name is on the registration for all three vehicles.
Then they have to know the meth lab is down, right, they can't find Meechum, so what are they going to do? I did some deeper background on The New America Front.
They're a classic white supremacist group.
I think if they were gonna target drug dealers, they would have gone after a black or Hispanic gang.
I mean, he was there for a reason.
Well, maybe, or maybe it's a black swan.
For a long time, Europeans believed that all swans were white.
And that notion only held true as long as their discovered world contained only white swans, but then Australia was discovered and the black swan was discovered, so their perceptions of the world and what swans were had to change.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb recently wrote a book in which he uses the term "black swan" to define any event that occurs outside the realm of expectations.
Like a drug raid that leads to a completely unrelated case? Yeah, I mean, we attempt to find causality in all events based on past experience, right, but Taleb argues that the biggest events can't be predicted because they just never happened before.
case in point.
Well, we n td to be focusing on the terror angle.
Well, we just caught a really lucky break 'cause the case just started to fit those charges.
Start working on it.
Oh, my, what was that about? What? I had to push a rule or two, and, you know, I mean, she disagrees.
What else is new? You had to? Yeah.
Hard not to notice a change in your methods.
Look, I'm tired of picking up the pieces.
Okay? It seems like all we do is get there too late, and I got a chance to stop something before it starts.
You still seeing your therapist? Taleb also says that we should rank our beliefs not by plausibility but by the harm they may cause.
Oh, hey.
I've come to recognize that expression.
It generally precedes a cancel breakfast date.
Another day, another moral quandary.
If I may make an observation Always.
You are a brilliant and credentialed woman; one for whom the world offers a multitude of possibilities Are you saying I should quit my job? No.
I'm merely suggesting that, if your reasons for doing this work have been challenged, or, uh, invalidated, then yeah, you need to find some new reasons or some new work.
See anything? Graph entropies and universality classes.
Nothing new there.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Do you think you're wrong? No.
Neither do I.
Guess we'll just have to let this program run its course.
Yeah.
In moments like this, the processes of criminal investigation and science seem to work at cross purposes, don't they? We need to be patient But not.
Right.
So after this is over, and before the next thing, I thought maybe you and I could take a trip to Delhi.
That's very sweet.
I thought so.
But I don't have the time or ability, and neither do you.
I just don't like seeing you unhappy like this.
So, I wanted to do something.
You just did.
What do you think happened to him? A girl? No.
Not in a whorehouse with a fistful of 20s.
No, he got the jeebies- halfway to Billings by now.
Meechum was a wannabe- told you he'd bolt from day one.
What if he said something about the magic show? What if he does? Won't stop anything.
"Magic show.
" Shotgun mikes aren't picking up anything on the inside- we do know they don't suspect we have Meechum.
Maybe time to hit the house; we've got enough for a warrant.
We'll have a few gun charges, if we're lucky.
I mean, we don't know who else is involved or where.
Or what the hell they're planning.
What do you think about getting a wire in there? No, these guys never step more than three feet outside the front door for a smoke.
One of 'em will go pick up groceries or something but never both.
I mean, it'll take a ninja.
Or a black swan.
Oh! What the hell? No, no, no, no! Come on! Oh, my God.
This is why you're not supposed to text and drive.
This is totally my fault.
Yes, it is your fault.
I have insurance.
Yeah.
Colby, go down the elevator shaft.
Colby, jump in the bay.
cl Here Colby, climb the Sixth Street Bridge.
th I went out on the bridge with you, okay? My boyfriend's totally going to kill me.
Look, forget about it.
Forget it, okay? Look.
It did more damage to your car than mine.
Yeah, but this is my fault.
Let's just exchange Forget about it, okay? No, no, no.
This is my fault, and look, your car's like a classic.
No, no, it's good.
It's fine.
Any luck? Facial recognition software, my brain is not.
But I've been through Intel's entire dossier on The New America Front, pretty sure he's not in there.
Meechum give us anything yet? No, and we've been on him hard.
We've been on this house for 38 hours now, as far as we can tell, he's never come out.
What the hell's he doing in there? There's just nothing with the bug? Nothing audible, anyway, and it doesn't look like they're using the upstairs for anything other than storage.
In fact, I think that Number Three came from the garage.
I mean duct tape and insulation I mean, you know, could be they're building their own soundproof prison cell in there.
Look, how long can we stay with this before we cut our losses and drag 'em in? Longer.
So, this is a stakeout, hmm? Yeah, sometimes they're boring.
What's that thing going to do for you? I don't know yet.
Um I just figured a little fielork might bring some welcome madness to my method, I guess.
I don't even know what I'm looking at here.
How he got to that hardware store, or the gas station.
There's no underlying meaning I can see yet.
Mmm.
What are you, what are you reading? Article on Billy Preston's work on Let it Be.
Mmm, The Beatles.
Yeah.
You're a fan? Of course.
Yeah, The Beatles.
Who isn't a fan? Yeah.
I mean I'm not an obsessed fan, you know.
Some people read every article.
Yeah.
You know, your screen, it, um, reminds me of this old video game I used to play.
"Missile Command," right? Yeah, "Missile Command.
" Right? You're-you're a fan of the classics? Well, they had all the old machines at, um, at the Calsci Rathskellar.
They had "Asteroids," "Space Invaders " Same thing at Cornell.
Man, I lost my whole sophomore year to "Frogger.
" I never had any quarters for the laundry, but I could do the first three levels with my eyes closed, man.
Back and forth.
Well, that's it "Frogger" is it? You knew all those first few levels by heart, because you played them so much.
They had a higher level of familiarity.
So maybe this map isn't just telling us about the streets and routes that Meechum didn't know- maybe it's telling us the streets and routes that he knew well.
So, all I have to do is, um I got us lunch.
Yeah, I'm sorry, I have to get Amita to rewrite this program.
And don't forget to use the back, okay? Right.
Sure.
Hi.
Is Charlie here yet? He said he needed some assistance.
No, he's not here yet.
Oh.
Searching for patterns of your own, I see.
Ahh Still trying to find a connection between Meechum and the meth lab.
You certain there is one? Otherwise it's just a really big coincidence.
Oh, an easily explained one.
I mean, you're both highly experienced, gifted investigators, you saw something amiss.
Now, the fact that Meechum shows up as you're in the process of making an arrest, well, that may be no more significant than if you bumped into him at a grocery store.
What, like a black swan, perhaps? Uh you know, a black swan is not really a coincidence.
I mean, it's more properly an unexpected, unpredictable event with large consequences.
Hmm.
You ever stop to consider the possibility that Meechum's arrest is not even your black swan, that maybe you are his? Our raid is the coincidence? Again, not really a coincidence.
So when they go out to smoke If Number Three is the alpha, maybe he is asserting his dominance- he, he doesn't want them stinking up the house.
Or he doesn't want them blowing it up.
Methamphetamine labs are filled with explosive chemicals.
Exactly.
What if Meechum wasn't there to rob them, he was there to do business, right? I mean, look.
We got acetone.
We got sulfur.
We got peroxide.
A highly combustive trio.
Which is really hard to buy in bulk without drawing attention to yourself.
We have Meechum in custody.
And since we've had him in custody, we've watched these guys make random trips to the pharmacy, to the grocery store Duct tape, insulation The New America Front They-They tried to blow up an IRS building in Montana; they're building a bomb.
They're making a really big bomb.
Or they're making a lot of littlones.
Okay, get SWAT and the bomb squad rolling, and LAPD evacuating the area.
This is highly exhilarating.
LAIKEN Grab the Mini-14 and the nines.
Leave the shotguns, get them on the next trip.
What about the cuffs? Yeah, the cuffs.
Gotcha.
Don thinks they're cooking a bomb in there; Tac's rolling.
They're not waiting.
Quigley and Laiken, they're on t move.
FBI! You! Hands up! Put down the gun! Stakeout Team Charlie, we got shots fired, and a fleeing vehicle.
Grey pickup truck, California plates 5QNI223.
Gun! What do you think? Wait or go? He could have more bombs in there.
That's kind of why I asked.
Go? Yeah, I knew you'd say "go.
" Hey! Come on out! It's over, okay? You've got nowhere to go! Sir! You're in a bomb lab! You know better than to But they also found glass at the scene, so they're thinking that Quigley has stolen another vehicle.
And Colby called.
They found cut lengths of pipe in the basement.
All right, so then pipe bombs, right? Well, you think this guy's running or is he going to finish what he started? A fanatic who spent five months preparing for a spectacular event.
And the federal government, who he already has something against, has, like, ruined his plan and killed all his friends.
You gotta ask? Got it.
I want to know everything.
I want to know it now! I want a phone call and a lawyer.
Laiken is dead.
They're taking your bomb maker out in pieces as we speak.
Now it's over.
If it were over you wouldn't have dragged me out of Guantanamo over Figueroa, would you? Do you even have a clue of the world of hurt you're in? Conspiracy to commit an act of domestic terrorism, maybe, maybe you see the light of day again.
That bomb goes off, you're a show trial.
You're dead in 18 months.
I'm not afraid to be remembered for the cause.
What cause? What? Tax evasion? The Posse Comitatus Act obligates us to mount resistance against an unlawful, immoral and hypocritical government.
You take away my freedom, deny me due process, and now you try to deal? Even if I would, why would I trust you? Okay, you're trying to make a political statement.
My voice will be heard.
At my trial, through my story, it'll get out.
Not while they're counting bodies.
Anything you have to say is going to get drowned out by the voices of dead, innocent people and the families they leave behind.
No, no, we had it worked out- no innocents.
We go in at night, secure the guards and the cleaners.
Get them out before Before? That's not the plan Quigley's following anymore.
That's blood on your hands.
Now how are we doing with the cluster radius changes? Almost entered.
You know, given our time constraints, we really should disregard sub locations.
Hey, tell us you have more data.
Security guards and cleaners.
Thinking it's an office building.
We're already biasing that way.
Okay, so something tall where everyone can see it.
You know, I think downtown maybe.
Okay, that's a presumptive jump.
That's where we are, right? The leaders went to jail for planning to bomb an IRS collections center.
A federal building, huh? kn You know what? Try something, uh Like Like that.
Okay.
Okay, this is a grid of dowatown streets that Meechum knew well enough not to use his GPS, but not explaining his other known trips.
Of course it could also mean that he had no reason to go to this area, but if we have to play the pure probabilities Know what, could you put up a satellite overlay? Yeah.
Anything federal? Uh, there's banks, commercial buildings, uh, hotels restaurants, uh You know, this plot was in retaliation for an IRS investigation into an SAR on three of their members.
"SAR"? Suspicious Activity Report.
Banks file them with the Treasury when they suspect money laundering or terror financing.
This particular SAR was filed by Farmers' American, whose central bank is Right there, right? Yeah.
Yeah, let's go.
* * Green jacket, green jacket, Move in.
Move in! Quigley, don't move! Don't move! Everybody out! You shoot me, we're a crater! All right.
All right, all right.
Just relax.
Don't tell me to relax.
Okay.
All right, let's just take a minute.
Let's just talk.
No talk! Everybody out! That's not going to happen.
That's just not going to happen.
I've got seven pipe bombs in here.
My finger twitches, there's enough shrapnel to shred everyone.
Look, how about I'll pull uniforms back? Let's start with that.
All right, guys, get out.
Okay? What are the rest of you waiting for? Huh? You got a death wish? Not me.
Do you? No.
I just want to help, man, that's it.
So what are we doing here? Just go, okay? I need to think.
I'll be straight with you.
We leave, there's a sniper up there who's going to blow your brains out.
I'm being totally honest with you.
Us standing here, that's about the only thing that's keeping you alive.
Why the hell are you saying this? Because this is pointless.
Look, you blow yourself up, they're going to scrape you off the walls and gonna be back in business in the morning.
I'm telling you, I see so much waste in what I do, man.
I'm just trying to stop you from doing something that I know is not going to mean anything.
Okay.
All right, let's pull out.
Let's go.
Wait! Okay, just wait.
Good, get your hands on your head.
Don't move.
That's a really interesting negotiation technique.
Hey, any bomb you can walk away from, right? * * We're all trying to back out, right There are some acts of heroism I would rather remain blissfully unaware of.
My son playing poker with a bomb, now that's right up there.
Okay, enough, come on.
I've got to say I second Alan's sentiment.
I'm far more comfortable with your bravery in the abstract.
Duly noted.
Really? 'Cause I figured that was part of the whole, uh The whole what, Granger? Charlie, what are you doing in there? Just a second.
Sounds serious.
He's not actually cooking, is he? Yes, he is.
Is that bad? As long as I'm not in there, for once.
What is for dinner? Charlie, what are you making? The invitation was pretty non-specific, buddy.
What's going on? It's an approximation at best, but I, uh, analyzed Roscoe's secret recipe.
I think it's pretty good.
Waffles for dinner? Waffles.
What's the deal with the waffles, man? I think it's Charlie's way of saying that your family is whoever you want to eat waffles with.
That's a worthy sentiment.
One that's even better with syrup.
Gotta have some bacon.
You made some bacon, right? Somebody tell me something about chicken? Where's the chicken? That's the whole meal? That's it, just waffles?
The first thing I tell you ba is probably the most important thing you'll hear today.
If you take nothing else away from this seminar- and you better take a lot more away from this seminar- I'll tell you that teaching is not about what you know.
It's about how you lead.
And of course, you are all leaders here.
Hit it! Hit it! marching your students along a path to illumination and intellectual independence, and that's a path known only to yourselves.
Which means, you better have a plan every single day.
There are days when you're going to feel intimidated, especially at the beginning.
You know, you'll feel like you're losing control.
On your knees! On your knees! That's why we're here- to be your support system, to back you up.
Don't move! Get 'em up! David, how we doing back there? Clear in front, Don.
All right, let's lock this place up, guys! Let's go! Lock it up tight! You know, in teaching, as well as in science, there is a place for your instincts, so learn to listen to them, learn to understand what they're telling you.
Are we missing anyone? Negative.
All 11 are under.
Frequently, intuition is simply your rational mind finding an ineloquent way of talking to you.
Hey, Colby, that guy in the red flannel shirt that SWAT just turned around? Yeah, Don, he was parking when we pulled up.
Bravo team says he checks out.
You know what? Pull that guy back.
I want to talk to him.
All right, 10-4.
Ultimately, the hallmark of any good teacher, of any good leader, is his belief in himself.
You know, with that belief comes the confidence of others.
Of course, it doesn't hurt being right.
Hey, hold up for a second.
Yeah, we got a runner going east on Sixth! So, uh, any questions? Wow.
That was strange.
Yeah.
and not a single question.
The silence was memorable.
Hmm.
And this from someone who lives in a monastery.
You know, I've done countless T.
A.
orientations.
That was a first.
It's funny how the most routine jobs can still surprise you.
Now we know why he ran- guns, cuffs, duct tape.
What tipped you off? I don't know.
Something about him.
Okay, this guy- he cruises a meth lab, right? He's got a kidnapper's shopping list in the back of his van.
Yeah, so, whatever he was up to, it's definitely not alone.
You get the feeling we're looking at the tip of a whole other iceberg? Duct tape, plastic handcuffs.
Those are cable ties, purchased legally at a hardware store.
I have the receipt.
Soundproofing insulation? Which is why I bought the duct tape.
Three handguns? Legitimately possessed, in accordance with all federal and local requirements.
Cruising around a meth lab.
I didn't know anything about a lab.
I was lost.
I asked the cops for directions to the freeway.
Then why'd you run? Illinois v.
Wardlow allows the police to stop anyone for the simple act of running.
It does not constitute grounds for arrest.
Yeah, well, we're not the police.
We're the Feds.
There's different rules, and a whole different set of problems for you.
You know, and having a smart answer to every question- it's not going to change the facts.
You were cruising that meth lab.
Played it cool when SWAT stopped you, but when my partner here took a second look, and you knew we were going to check inside your van- I just think you lost your spine.
Illinois v.
Wardlow I guess you didn't want us to find your legally-purchased duct tape and your insulation and your handcuffs and your guns.
You can't prove anything.
Oh, I think we will.
And while that's happening, you're just going to sit here and think about every mistake you made, and how easy it's going to be for us to find them.
Because when we find those mistakes, any chance you have of coming clean and making a deal goes away, and so do you.
Isaac Meechum came from Helena, Montana five months ago, or at least, that's when he changed over his license.
No rap sheet? Not even a speeding ticket, but if you're going to send out a guy to go buy ammunition, guns and ducttape We found registered purchases for 15 rifles and pistols.
That's including the three we already recovered.
Which makes sense.
If you're going to hit a meth lab, you're going to need some serious firepower and some partners.
All right, so where are the rest of them? That's a good question.
LAPD tossed this guy's apartment, but not only weren't there any guns, super says he hadn't seen the guy in a couple of weeks.
So, what, we got, a stash house? Well, Intelligence Unit did have something.
They have a connection to a Montana group called The New America Front.
Those guys are pro-gun, anti-government, anti-tax, and you can pretty much guess why Meechum didn't make eye contact with me once.
Their leaders were arrested last year for planning to bomb an IRS collection center, and the rest of them scattered, so, we might be looking at, like, a splinter group, trying to fund a new attack.
Well, good.
Then we'll hold him as a domestic terror suspect.
This is just a theory.
So what? We don't want him getting to a phone before we find out if there's a stash house or where the rest of the people are, right? That's arbitrary suppression of due process.
If that's what it takes, fine.
You know, we also, uh, found one of those portable GPS navigation devices in Meechum's van.
Which also makes sense if you're new to L.
A.
Did you check the addresses on it? It's mostly restaurants, bars, some hardware stores, but, look, I was thinking.
If his partners don't know we nabbed this guy, yet, right- they're going to start wondering where he is, so, maybe we drop the van at the last bar Meechum went to.
Maybe we get lucky.
They find the van.
We find the partners? It's a pretty basic GPS with no data on times or routes.
Just the ten most recent destinations he typed in.
Right, which gives us 11 points, including the meth lab.
So, I see a map with a bunch of dots on it.
I figure you can tell me something.
Maybe even find the stash house.
Oh, you know, there's not enough data here for any kind of inference.
Uh, maybe some application of Floyd-Warshall? Hmm.
Wouldn't the process of comparing all potential routes between each set of points require a lot of brute force? That's just not an expression I would normally associate with, uh Well, anyway.
Yeah.
Understood.
Well, we know the order that the locations were arrived at, so, what about doing a time series analysis of overlapping Dirichlet tessellations? Wow.
Mm-hmm.
See, each location is a place that Meechum couldn't find without his GPS, so we can assume that he's unfamiliar with the other streets in the area, as well.
From there, we build out.
Like driving a stake into a frozen river.
We can watch the cracks grow.
The more stakes we drive, the more cracks we can analyze.
And the pattern will present itself.
Yeah, but what kind of pattern? That's the best part.
We won't know until we do it.
Heady stuff, Charles.
I smell a paper here, at the very least.
Yeah.
We'll need Amita, and dry erase boards.
Lots of dry erase boards.
Hey, Amita.
Hey, Alan.
Um, you know, I think Charlie's still in his classroom, but here.
Whoa.
What are we looking for? Uh, nothing.
We are tidying up, because my parents are finally coming on Tuesday after canceling on me twice.
Oh, and what does that got to do with Charlie's office? Um Absolutely nothing.
Just lots of nervous energy.
Yeah, well, a little excitement under the circumstances is quite understandable.
Yeah, it's been a year since they went back to India, and, um, every time they come to town, we have a tradition.
We take a hike through Elysian Park, and then, we go to Roscoe's for waffles.
Waffles? Yes.
Waffles.
You know, when I was little, we each made a list of our five favorite foods, and waffles was the only thing that made it on each of our lists.
Oh.
And honestly, I think my dad just put it on ere because he knew how much I loved them.
Oh.
Sorry.
That's my mom.
Probably texting me the flight info.
What? Bad news? Well, they-they, um they have to postpone again.
Oh.
Uh, an emergency meeting with the Ministry of Finance.
Yeah, well, I'm sure they're just as disappointed as you are.
Yeah, I'm sure they are.
Here, sorry.
Let me take these.
Oh, thanks.
I'm sorry.
Uh Did I tell you about the dog? That's the one that followed you home from jogging.
Then the owner saw you, he called the cops, and he accused you of dognapping.
Yeah.
About two hours ago.
Right.
Hey, guess who called me, man, after you said she was never going to do it.
Yeah, you told me.
Well, I guess that's it.
We've, uh, officially run out of stuff to talk about.
Okay.
All right, 20 bucks says we get a bite before midnight.
All right, how do you define a bite? Looking in the window, trying the door? Well, not a window, definitely a door.
Door's a bite.
Double or nothing on the Le Mans.
What do you mean double or nothing, man? I was just betting on the bite.
All right, they're going inside to see if Meechum's passed out on the bar.
Checking the bathroom.
Now he's wondering what the hell happened.
Ten more minutes and I would have made 20 bucks.
Right in front of us? They find the hardware but no guns.
What are they thinking? They're thinking Meechum got halfway through his shopping list, fell into the gin mill, got dragged ho by some girl.
I've been to plenty of gin mills in my day, man.
Who are these women that just drag you home and where do I find them? You, my friend, are a prisoner of high standards and low social skills.
* * Looks like we found the stash house.
Now we just have to figure out what the hell's going on inside.
Thank you, soft real estate market.
We like? We like.
Hey, heads up.
Yeah, I know that they're busy and that their work is very important, but Consulting on the national finances of the second-largest population on the planet but if you're angry, so am I, within whatever acceptable boundaries won't come back to haunt me later.
It's not that I'm mad, it's just- I mean, do you know what it feels like to not see your family for a really long time? That hasn't been a problem for me for quite a while.
Well, I don't know, I mean, lately my parents just feel like a pair of voices, and I feel disconnected, like a piece of who I am is starting to blur.
Well, you are connected, and they will come eventually.
Uh Hey, guys, bad time? You kidding? Last week I walked in on them and they were Thanks, Dad.
Uh, what brings you here so late? Well, I wasn't gonna wake you up, but I was actually driving by and I saw the lights were on, so Maybe I should make a cup of coffee for somebody here? Not for me; I need to grab a few hours shut-eye.
Well, we already factored the house into our computations.
It's really moving the work along.
Moving it to what, exactly? Uncharted territory.
The Dirichlet tessellations have something to tell us.
I know it every time I look at this map, even if I don't know what.
That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about.
What if they're using three different vehicles? I mean, can we factor in situations where they would use one but not the other two? We like a mathematician.
inking He's definitely starting to sound like one.
Facial recognition software gives subject one a 95% match and subject two a 93% match.
I have no doubt it's the same guy.
Joshua Quigley has an arrest for assault, possession of unregistered weapons, tax evasion.
Bernard Laiken- assault, possession of unregistered weapons.
Am Both in The New America Front.
You know, the subject house was rented by Meechum.
Meechum's name is on the registration for all three vehicles.
Then they have to know the meth lab is down, right, they can't find Meechum, so what are they going to do? I did some deeper background on The New America Front.
They're a classic white supremacist group.
I think if they were gonna target drug dealers, they would have gone after a black or Hispanic gang.
I mean, he was there for a reason.
Well, maybe, or maybe it's a black swan.
For a long time, Europeans believed that all swans were white.
And that notion only held true as long as their discovered world contained only white swans, but then Australia was discovered and the black swan was discovered, so their perceptions of the world and what swans were had to change.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb recently wrote a book in which he uses the term "black swan" to define any event that occurs outside the realm of expectations.
Like a drug raid that leads to a completely unrelated case? Yeah, I mean, we attempt to find causality in all events based on past experience, right, but Taleb argues that the biggest events can't be predicted because they just never happened before.
case in point.
Well, we n td to be focusing on the terror angle.
Well, we just caught a really lucky break 'cause the case just started to fit those charges.
Start working on it.
Oh, my, what was that about? What? I had to push a rule or two, and, you know, I mean, she disagrees.
What else is new? You had to? Yeah.
Hard not to notice a change in your methods.
Look, I'm tired of picking up the pieces.
Okay? It seems like all we do is get there too late, and I got a chance to stop something before it starts.
You still seeing your therapist? Taleb also says that we should rank our beliefs not by plausibility but by the harm they may cause.
Oh, hey.
I've come to recognize that expression.
It generally precedes a cancel breakfast date.
Another day, another moral quandary.
If I may make an observation Always.
You are a brilliant and credentialed woman; one for whom the world offers a multitude of possibilities Are you saying I should quit my job? No.
I'm merely suggesting that, if your reasons for doing this work have been challenged, or, uh, invalidated, then yeah, you need to find some new reasons or some new work.
See anything? Graph entropies and universality classes.
Nothing new there.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Do you think you're wrong? No.
Neither do I.
Guess we'll just have to let this program run its course.
Yeah.
In moments like this, the processes of criminal investigation and science seem to work at cross purposes, don't they? We need to be patient But not.
Right.
So after this is over, and before the next thing, I thought maybe you and I could take a trip to Delhi.
That's very sweet.
I thought so.
But I don't have the time or ability, and neither do you.
I just don't like seeing you unhappy like this.
So, I wanted to do something.
You just did.
What do you think happened to him? A girl? No.
Not in a whorehouse with a fistful of 20s.
No, he got the jeebies- halfway to Billings by now.
Meechum was a wannabe- told you he'd bolt from day one.
What if he said something about the magic show? What if he does? Won't stop anything.
"Magic show.
" Shotgun mikes aren't picking up anything on the inside- we do know they don't suspect we have Meechum.
Maybe time to hit the house; we've got enough for a warrant.
We'll have a few gun charges, if we're lucky.
I mean, we don't know who else is involved or where.
Or what the hell they're planning.
What do you think about getting a wire in there? No, these guys never step more than three feet outside the front door for a smoke.
One of 'em will go pick up groceries or something but never both.
I mean, it'll take a ninja.
Or a black swan.
Oh! What the hell? No, no, no, no! Come on! Oh, my God.
This is why you're not supposed to text and drive.
This is totally my fault.
Yes, it is your fault.
I have insurance.
Yeah.
Colby, go down the elevator shaft.
Colby, jump in the bay.
cl Here Colby, climb the Sixth Street Bridge.
th I went out on the bridge with you, okay? My boyfriend's totally going to kill me.
Look, forget about it.
Forget it, okay? Look.
It did more damage to your car than mine.
Yeah, but this is my fault.
Let's just exchange Forget about it, okay? No, no, no.
This is my fault, and look, your car's like a classic.
No, no, it's good.
It's fine.
Any luck? Facial recognition software, my brain is not.
But I've been through Intel's entire dossier on The New America Front, pretty sure he's not in there.
Meechum give us anything yet? No, and we've been on him hard.
We've been on this house for 38 hours now, as far as we can tell, he's never come out.
What the hell's he doing in there? There's just nothing with the bug? Nothing audible, anyway, and it doesn't look like they're using the upstairs for anything other than storage.
In fact, I think that Number Three came from the garage.
I mean duct tape and insulation I mean, you know, could be they're building their own soundproof prison cell in there.
Look, how long can we stay with this before we cut our losses and drag 'em in? Longer.
So, this is a stakeout, hmm? Yeah, sometimes they're boring.
What's that thing going to do for you? I don't know yet.
Um I just figured a little fielork might bring some welcome madness to my method, I guess.
I don't even know what I'm looking at here.
How he got to that hardware store, or the gas station.
There's no underlying meaning I can see yet.
Mmm.
What are you, what are you reading? Article on Billy Preston's work on Let it Be.
Mmm, The Beatles.
Yeah.
You're a fan? Of course.
Yeah, The Beatles.
Who isn't a fan? Yeah.
I mean I'm not an obsessed fan, you know.
Some people read every article.
Yeah.
You know, your screen, it, um, reminds me of this old video game I used to play.
"Missile Command," right? Yeah, "Missile Command.
" Right? You're-you're a fan of the classics? Well, they had all the old machines at, um, at the Calsci Rathskellar.
They had "Asteroids," "Space Invaders " Same thing at Cornell.
Man, I lost my whole sophomore year to "Frogger.
" I never had any quarters for the laundry, but I could do the first three levels with my eyes closed, man.
Back and forth.
Well, that's it "Frogger" is it? You knew all those first few levels by heart, because you played them so much.
They had a higher level of familiarity.
So maybe this map isn't just telling us about the streets and routes that Meechum didn't know- maybe it's telling us the streets and routes that he knew well.
So, all I have to do is, um I got us lunch.
Yeah, I'm sorry, I have to get Amita to rewrite this program.
And don't forget to use the back, okay? Right.
Sure.
Hi.
Is Charlie here yet? He said he needed some assistance.
No, he's not here yet.
Oh.
Searching for patterns of your own, I see.
Ahh Still trying to find a connection between Meechum and the meth lab.
You certain there is one? Otherwise it's just a really big coincidence.
Oh, an easily explained one.
I mean, you're both highly experienced, gifted investigators, you saw something amiss.
Now, the fact that Meechum shows up as you're in the process of making an arrest, well, that may be no more significant than if you bumped into him at a grocery store.
What, like a black swan, perhaps? Uh you know, a black swan is not really a coincidence.
I mean, it's more properly an unexpected, unpredictable event with large consequences.
Hmm.
You ever stop to consider the possibility that Meechum's arrest is not even your black swan, that maybe you are his? Our raid is the coincidence? Again, not really a coincidence.
So when they go out to smoke If Number Three is the alpha, maybe he is asserting his dominance- he, he doesn't want them stinking up the house.
Or he doesn't want them blowing it up.
Methamphetamine labs are filled with explosive chemicals.
Exactly.
What if Meechum wasn't there to rob them, he was there to do business, right? I mean, look.
We got acetone.
We got sulfur.
We got peroxide.
A highly combustive trio.
Which is really hard to buy in bulk without drawing attention to yourself.
We have Meechum in custody.
And since we've had him in custody, we've watched these guys make random trips to the pharmacy, to the grocery store Duct tape, insulation The New America Front They-They tried to blow up an IRS building in Montana; they're building a bomb.
They're making a really big bomb.
Or they're making a lot of littlones.
Okay, get SWAT and the bomb squad rolling, and LAPD evacuating the area.
This is highly exhilarating.
LAIKEN Grab the Mini-14 and the nines.
Leave the shotguns, get them on the next trip.
What about the cuffs? Yeah, the cuffs.
Gotcha.
Don thinks they're cooking a bomb in there; Tac's rolling.
They're not waiting.
Quigley and Laiken, they're on t move.
FBI! You! Hands up! Put down the gun! Stakeout Team Charlie, we got shots fired, and a fleeing vehicle.
Grey pickup truck, California plates 5QNI223.
Gun! What do you think? Wait or go? He could have more bombs in there.
That's kind of why I asked.
Go? Yeah, I knew you'd say "go.
" Hey! Come on out! It's over, okay? You've got nowhere to go! Sir! You're in a bomb lab! You know better than to But they also found glass at the scene, so they're thinking that Quigley has stolen another vehicle.
And Colby called.
They found cut lengths of pipe in the basement.
All right, so then pipe bombs, right? Well, you think this guy's running or is he going to finish what he started? A fanatic who spent five months preparing for a spectacular event.
And the federal government, who he already has something against, has, like, ruined his plan and killed all his friends.
You gotta ask? Got it.
I want to know everything.
I want to know it now! I want a phone call and a lawyer.
Laiken is dead.
They're taking your bomb maker out in pieces as we speak.
Now it's over.
If it were over you wouldn't have dragged me out of Guantanamo over Figueroa, would you? Do you even have a clue of the world of hurt you're in? Conspiracy to commit an act of domestic terrorism, maybe, maybe you see the light of day again.
That bomb goes off, you're a show trial.
You're dead in 18 months.
I'm not afraid to be remembered for the cause.
What cause? What? Tax evasion? The Posse Comitatus Act obligates us to mount resistance against an unlawful, immoral and hypocritical government.
You take away my freedom, deny me due process, and now you try to deal? Even if I would, why would I trust you? Okay, you're trying to make a political statement.
My voice will be heard.
At my trial, through my story, it'll get out.
Not while they're counting bodies.
Anything you have to say is going to get drowned out by the voices of dead, innocent people and the families they leave behind.
No, no, we had it worked out- no innocents.
We go in at night, secure the guards and the cleaners.
Get them out before Before? That's not the plan Quigley's following anymore.
That's blood on your hands.
Now how are we doing with the cluster radius changes? Almost entered.
You know, given our time constraints, we really should disregard sub locations.
Hey, tell us you have more data.
Security guards and cleaners.
Thinking it's an office building.
We're already biasing that way.
Okay, so something tall where everyone can see it.
You know, I think downtown maybe.
Okay, that's a presumptive jump.
That's where we are, right? The leaders went to jail for planning to bomb an IRS collections center.
A federal building, huh? kn You know what? Try something, uh Like Like that.
Okay.
Okay, this is a grid of dowatown streets that Meechum knew well enough not to use his GPS, but not explaining his other known trips.
Of course it could also mean that he had no reason to go to this area, but if we have to play the pure probabilities Know what, could you put up a satellite overlay? Yeah.
Anything federal? Uh, there's banks, commercial buildings, uh, hotels restaurants, uh You know, this plot was in retaliation for an IRS investigation into an SAR on three of their members.
"SAR"? Suspicious Activity Report.
Banks file them with the Treasury when they suspect money laundering or terror financing.
This particular SAR was filed by Farmers' American, whose central bank is Right there, right? Yeah.
Yeah, let's go.
* * Green jacket, green jacket, Move in.
Move in! Quigley, don't move! Don't move! Everybody out! You shoot me, we're a crater! All right.
All right, all right.
Just relax.
Don't tell me to relax.
Okay.
All right, let's just take a minute.
Let's just talk.
No talk! Everybody out! That's not going to happen.
That's just not going to happen.
I've got seven pipe bombs in here.
My finger twitches, there's enough shrapnel to shred everyone.
Look, how about I'll pull uniforms back? Let's start with that.
All right, guys, get out.
Okay? What are the rest of you waiting for? Huh? You got a death wish? Not me.
Do you? No.
I just want to help, man, that's it.
So what are we doing here? Just go, okay? I need to think.
I'll be straight with you.
We leave, there's a sniper up there who's going to blow your brains out.
I'm being totally honest with you.
Us standing here, that's about the only thing that's keeping you alive.
Why the hell are you saying this? Because this is pointless.
Look, you blow yourself up, they're going to scrape you off the walls and gonna be back in business in the morning.
I'm telling you, I see so much waste in what I do, man.
I'm just trying to stop you from doing something that I know is not going to mean anything.
Okay.
All right, let's pull out.
Let's go.
Wait! Okay, just wait.
Good, get your hands on your head.
Don't move.
That's a really interesting negotiation technique.
Hey, any bomb you can walk away from, right? * * We're all trying to back out, right There are some acts of heroism I would rather remain blissfully unaware of.
My son playing poker with a bomb, now that's right up there.
Okay, enough, come on.
I've got to say I second Alan's sentiment.
I'm far more comfortable with your bravery in the abstract.
Duly noted.
Really? 'Cause I figured that was part of the whole, uh The whole what, Granger? Charlie, what are you doing in there? Just a second.
Sounds serious.
He's not actually cooking, is he? Yes, he is.
Is that bad? As long as I'm not in there, for once.
What is for dinner? Charlie, what are you making? The invitation was pretty non-specific, buddy.
What's going on? It's an approximation at best, but I, uh, analyzed Roscoe's secret recipe.
I think it's pretty good.
Waffles for dinner? Waffles.
What's the deal with the waffles, man? I think it's Charlie's way of saying that your family is whoever you want to eat waffles with.
That's a worthy sentiment.
One that's even better with syrup.
Gotta have some bacon.
You made some bacon, right? Somebody tell me something about chicken? Where's the chicken? That's the whole meal? That's it, just waffles?