Castle s06e19 Episode Script
The Greater Good
What if we got married on the Cyclone? The roller coaster at Coney Island? Come on.
How much fun would that be? And talk about an appropriate, if not slightly on-the-nose metaphor a bride and groom together, side-by-side, as they go through the ups and downs, the twists and turns, and the loop-de-loops of life.
Castle, I love you, but I will not marry you on a ride or up in space or on a slide.
Bet Dr.
Seuss got married somewhere fun.
Yes, his wife's living room.
How many people do you think can fit in one of those roller-coaster cars, anyway? You know, that's a good point.
We should determine exactly whom we are going to invite.
Yeah, good idea.
That way we can determine exactly how big a roller-coaster car we need to build.
Or how big of an actual venue we need.
Either way, I'll go and get the paper.
I'll get a pen.
And I will get the phone.
Beckett.
You know, there's a good argument for keeping the list really small.
Just immediate family.
This argument doesn't have something to do with a certain amusement park ride, does it? I'm being serious.
Getting married is an intimate act, and our ceremony should reflect that intimacy.
And that way, we could all fit into one car.
Ryan, how do you feel about roller coasters? Ooh, make me nauseous.
Why? No reason.
Who's our victim? Peter Cordero, 26.
According to the super, he lives alone.
He's a future's trader at JP Harding, the Wall Street investment firm.
And how was he killed? Uh, single GSW to the chest.
Looks like his own future got traded.
Yeah, not without a fight first.
Who found the body? Well, that's an interesting question.
At 10:03 P.
M.
, a woman made a 911 call from a pay phone down the block, but she refused to leave her name.
A pay phone down the block? But how would she know he was dead unless Unless she was in the apartment.
Well, lividity places the time of death between 8:00 and 10:00, so if the 911 call came in at 10:03 She could be our killer.
Esposito's checking security-cam footage.
Hopefully, we caught her on tape.
Now, is it just me, or is it odd that our victim is wearing a suit jacket, tie, pants, shoes, but his shirt is unbuttoned? It's odd, all right.
And look at this his shirt was on and buttoned when he was shot.
So our killer unbuttoned his shirt after he was dead.
Yep.
The killer was looking for something.
A pricy necklace or oh, a bunch of cash taped to his chest like "Wolf of Wall Street.
" There's something else.
I didn't find any defensive wounds, so if there was a fight out there, I don't think this guy was in it.
Yo, Beckett.
There are no security cameras in the lobby, but I found one in a liquor store down the street.
It got a shot of that pay phone right when the 911 call came in.
Okay.
Canvas the neighbors.
See if anyone saw her in the building.
Did you talk to next of kin yet? Well, the guy didn't have any immediate family, but he did list a cousin in Queens, a Maria Cordero, as his in-case-of-emergency.
All right, bring her in.
Let's see if she recognizes the woman in the photo.
Castle and I will go to his place of work and see what they know there.
All right.
No.
No.
I'm sorry.
I don't know her.
Maria, did your cousin say anything about having a girlfriend? No.
He said he didn't have time.
Work was his life.
Were the two of you close? Peter was like my brother.
When he was 10, his parents died in the big earthquake in Venezuela.
My parents adopted him and brought him to the States.
Did Peter say anything about having any enemies? No.
Peter was a sweet guy.
He never forgot where he came from not like those privileged, silver-spoon types he worked with.
He was a scholarship kid, so everything he got was through hard work.
When did you talk to him last? A few days ago.
And how did he seem? Stressed, actually.
Did he say what about? No.
I I don't know.
When I asked him, he said something happened at work, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle.
JP Harding Investment Bank.
This place is either the engine of capitalism or the poster child of greed and corruption, depending on which paper you read.
Maybe the invisible hand of the market killed Peter.
It would explain the lack of defensive wounds.
You know, prep-school buddy of mine came to work here out of college.
He made a quarter of a billion dollars before he was 30, retired, and bought an island.
Wait.
He owns his own island? We should definitely invite him to the wedding.
Excuse me.
Hi, I'm detective Beckett.
We need to speak with Peter Cordero's boss.
Jamie Berman, I believe? Can I tell him what it's regarding? Killing are you capable of it? Because if you are, I will make you rich.
Goldman just poached Consolidated's pension account from us this morning, so I am offering a bounty.
Neal? A million dollars to the first son of a bitch at this table to poach an account back from Goldman.
It's open season, guys open-hunting season.
I want you to make them bleed! Excuse me.
All right, let's go! Excuse me, Mr.
Berman.
Detective Beckett.
Could we have a word, please? I told you S.
E.
C.
pricks to talk to my lawyer.
I'm not S.
E.
C.
I'm NYPD homicide.
Homicide? I apologize for the theatrics, detective, but in this world, it gets results.
And here I thought the stories of Wall Street excess were exaggerated.
Mr.
Berman, I understand that Peter Cordero reported directly to you.
Yes, he was my best commodities' trader.
And one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet.
In this part of the world, anyway.
Do you have any leads? Uh, just one.
Do you recognize this woman? No.
I'm afraid I don't.
Well, according to Peter Cordero's family, he was having some trouble here at work.
Do you have any idea what that might have been? No idea.
In fact, he was having one of the best months he's ever had.
And what about his clients? Any problems there? Well, Pete was a rising star.
His clients loved him But But what? Last week, I was taking the stairs to the 65th floor my version of exercise and I saw Peter in the stairwell with this guy who looked like a gangbanger.
All tatted up his neck, big scar on his cheek.
Not the kind of guy you ever see down here.
And he was handing Peter a package about yea big.
When Peter saw me, he looked guilty as hell.
So I just kept walking.
And you didn't ask him about it? Yeah, I did later, but he said it was nothing, so I just let it go.
You saw a gangbanger in your stairwell, and you just let it go? This is a high-stress environment, detective.
We don't ask a lot of questions about what our people do to to get through the day.
Okay.
Do you think you can describe him to a sketch artist? I think so.
Great.
I need the names of all of Peter's associates here at work.
Of course.
Lanie's got something for us.
Still no indication of defensive wounds, but I did find this when I checked his nails for DNA.
Numbers.
"7, 2, 3, 5, 9, 8.
" He wrote it in pen I'd say four or five days ago.
But that's not why I called you.
Look at this.
On his chest, next to the "Y" incision.
- Look at what? - It's subtle so subtle, I almost missed it.
But I think it explains why his shirt was ripped open.
- You see this grainy material? - Yeah.
It's adhesive residue.
In fact, there's a residue pattern from his belly to his chest.
Adhesive? Mm-hmm.
Looking at the pattern, I'd say your Wall Street wolf was wearing a wire.
A wire? Yes, sir.
We believe our killer removed it from the victim's body after shooting him.
Do we know who he was wearing a wire for? Well, we're checking with other branches of law enforcement right now.
What about this woman who called in the murder? Have you been able to identify her? You know, no one in Cordero's life seems to know who she is, and we have no idea where to find her.
I think she just found us.
Oh, Lord.
I'd say your case just got a lot more complicated.
What is it, sir? They're from the U.
S.
Attorney's Office.
You know them? Uh, not the woman from the photo, but the woman with her is Elizabeth Weston, the U.
S.
Attorney for the Southern District.
She also happens to be my sister.
Castle 6x19 - The Greater Good Original air date March 24, 2014 Victoria.
Been a while.
Yes, it has.
And who is this? I'm Stefanie Goldmark, Assistant U.
S.
Attorney.
We're here about the Cordero murder.
Oh, well, that's funny, because we have a few questions about that ourselves.
Starting, Ms.
Goldmark, with why you didn't identify yourself when you made that 911 call from the pay phone.
Because I instructed her not to.
I couldn't afford to compromise our investigation.
What investigation? Is there somewhere private we can talk? All right, Elizabeth, what's this all about? Your victim was a confidential informant for my office in an ongoing criminal investigation of JP Harding.
Which is why Cordero was wearing a wire.
Yes, and since JP Harding is on the 65th floor, we couldn't monitor it live.
Cordero put it on every morning and turned it in every night, along with the attached recording device.
Only last night, he didn't.
I went to his apartment to see what happened.
That's when I found him, and the wire was gone.
We think that there was something key to our investigation on that wire and that's why he was killed.
So where are you on leads? Well, uh, ballistics is running the slug, but right now the only lead is this sketch, provided by Mr.
Cordero's boss, Jamie Berman.
It's of a man he saw with our victim.
Well, I wouldn't put much credence in that sketch.
Why? Why is that? Because Berman is the target of our investigation.
Jamie Berman, head of JP Harding? We've been trying to mount a case against him for years insider trading, securities fraud.
We know he's doing it.
We just haven't been able to get proof.
Not without getting inside.
Berman's too careful.
Then, last month, we caught a break.
Peter Cordero was found with a baggie of cocaine during a stop-and-frisk.
With his priors for possession when he was a teen, he was facing 5 to 10.
You got Cordero to play ball.
He jumped at an immunity deal.
He'd already gotten valuable information on his wire recordings.
But yesterday, he was scheduled to meet with Berman one-on-one.
He was gonna push him to open up about some of his deals.
Cordero may have pushed too hard.
We think Berman made Cordero in that meeting.
So you think Jamie Berman's somehow responsible for Cordero's death? Well, if Berman knew he had incriminated himself on tape He'd go to any lengths to get it back.
Victoria, this investigation is ongoing, and exposing it to Mr.
Berman or anyone at JP Harding would break federal statutes.
But I thought that this was something that you and your team needed to know.
I'd certainly say so.
So I trust that you will keep my office in the loop if there are any significant developments.
Is that clear? Of course.
Sir, I didn't I didn't know you had a sister.
Oh, well, now you do.
U.
S.
Attorney for the Southern District? That's a really big deal.
Why hasn't Gates ever mentioned her before? I don't know, but there was definitely a subtle chill between the two of them.
"A subtle chill"? More like a polar vortex.
I'm guessing something happened between them in the past something deeply personal that Gates does not want us to know about.
I'll give you a dollar if you ask her.
- No way.
- Come on.
Aren't you curious? Yeah, but I like my job too much.
Hey, so, uh, there may be something to the U.
S.
Attorney's theory.
I checked Cordero's calendar.
He was scheduled to meet with Berman at 5:00 P.
M.
yesterday.
And whatever they talked about, it got heated.
How do you know that? According to building security, the two of them left shortly after and seemed to be in the middle of a fight.
Yeah, Peter and I had words yesterday.
So what? So, you didn't tell us about that - when we talked this morning.
- 'Cause it wasn't relevant.
How is it not relevant? The video shows you leaving together.
Two hours later, he's dead.
It's not relevant because I didn't kill him.
Honestly, detective, what would be my motive? What exactly were the two of you arguing about? A business deal.
You looked pretty worked up for a business deal.
There was a lot riding on it.
What was the deal? Client confidentiality, detective.
I'm not at liberty to discuss it.
You had a meeting with Peter before that.
What were you speaking about then? Other financial matters.
What kind of financial matters? Sensitive ones, any discussion of which, even with law enforcement, would be considered insider trading.
So unless you have a subpoena Who else was at the meeting? Just the two of us.
And what did you do after you left the lobby? Oh, we walked up Lafayette and parted ways around Spring.
What time was that? Around 6:15.
Where were you between 8:00 and 10:00? At my usual table at Le Cirque.
Feel free to check.
It's time.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a conference call with the Fed.
Oh, and if you want to talk to me again, detective, call my lawyer.
Le Cirque confirms that Berman was there from 8:00 P.
M.
till 10:25.
Couldn't have been him.
'Cause a guy like Berman isn't gonna get his hands dirty.
He's gonna hire someone.
No, your sister's right.
Berman is behind this.
And speaking of your sister Let's not.
If Berman is behind this, he will do everything he can to protect himself.
Knowing that the feds are watching him, he would be careful to cover his tracks.
It's gonna be next to impossible to trace this back to him.
So, all we're really sure of is that the sketch he gave us is a load of fictitious crap meant to send us in the wrong direction.
It's not as fictitious as you think.
I just got the ballistics back on the bullet that killed Cordero.
Striations match a slug that was pulled from a robbery shooting at a bodega in the Bronx three months ago.
The detectives couldn't make a case, but their three best suspects were gang members, including this guy.
Same guy.
Same gun.
Hector Nunez? Yeah, runs the South Bronx territory of Los Caballeros gang.
Priors include assault, attempted manslaughter, and conspiracy to distribute cocaine.
No, you're wrong.
Peter had nothing to do with cocaine.
He hated drugs.
Do you know he was arrested last month for possession? That's impossible.
I know Peter.
He'd never use that stuff.
Are you sure, Maria? Because he was seen receiving a package last week from this guy.
No.
No.
It it can't be.
Do you recognize him? Hector Nunez.
He was Peter's best friend growing up.
But then he got mixed up in a gang, and he tried to drag Peter in, too.
Afterwards, Hector changed.
He became dangerous.
Peter cut ties with him over a decade ago.
Can you think of any reason why he'd be back in Peter's life? Hector was a devil.
Peter would have never gotten mixed up with him again unless he didn't have a choice.
This is a long way from Wall Street.
This doesn't make any sense.
If Peter was into drugs, he had enough money to get them from downtown.
Why would he risk getting them from someone that he knew was dangerous? There it is El Baile Club.
Yeah, unofficial headquarters of Los Caballeros.
Stick close.
If Hector's as dangerous as advertised, things might get a little hairy.
"Hairy's" my middle name.
That sounded a lot better in my head.
Are you sure this is the right place? Those guys don't look very dangerous.
What about those guys? Ah, you mean the heavily-armed ones.
We're looking for Hector Nunez.
Beckett.
Hector Nunez? Detective Beckett, NYPD.
Detective, you shouldn't be here.
You could get hurt.
It's a dangerous neighborhood.
Yeah, well, maybe I should take you down to my neighborhood.
Let me save you some time.
Whatever it is, I didn't do it.
And I suppose you've never heard of a Peter Cordero, either.
What about Peter? He's dead.
Who did this? Well, we were thinking you might be able to tell us.
I'd never hurt Peter.
He was my best friend.
When we were kids and the gang wanted to take him, I wouldn't let them.
I knew he could do better.
So how did he end up shot and killed with your gun? Something was going on with him.
He called me last week first time in years.
Said he was into some deal that was gonna make him rich, but it was dangerous.
In case something went wrong, he needed to protect himself.
He said he need a weapon.
You're saying you gave him that gun? Well, he said he couldn't buy one himself 'cause he was being watched all the time.
Was that what was in the package you gave him in the stairwell? Yeah.
That deal that he was into was it drugs? Not drugs, money.
Something to do with bank accounts.
"Bank accounts"? Last Thursday night, he came to me, said he needed one last favor.
He wanted me to take an envelope to a manager at some bank in Midtown Suisse Federal or something.
Why couldn't he just do it himself? Why would he need you? Said he couldn't afford to be seen at the bank was too risky.
What was in the envelope? He said something about transfer instructions.
It was sealed, but there was a bank account number written on the outside.
Do you remember the number? Wrote it down in case something went wrong.
I guess it did.
Not the same six-digit number that was on his hand.
After I took the envelope to the bank, I called Peter at work to confirm it was done.
That's the last time we talked.
Hector's alibi checks out.
He was at Lady of Mercy nursing home visiting his mom when Peter was killed.
Mysterious financial transactions, a deal so dangerous he needed a gun seems to me there's a lot more to your sister's star witness than she knew.
"Than she knew" or than she chose to tell us about? Sir? Yo.
Talked to the manager at Suisse Federal.
He confirmed that a bank account with those numbers exists, but he refused to give out any information on it.
Did he at least acknowledge it was Peter Cordero's account? He couldn't, because he didn't know himself.
It's a numbered account set up for privacy, so the only way that anyone can access it is with a password.
So there's no way to know what Cordero was doing.
No.
Unless Six digits? Seems kind of password-y to me.
Okay, read it to me.
Come on.
We're in.
Castle, you've done it again.
What's it say? The balance is zero dollars.
Zero dollars? That doesn't seem very dangerous.
Feels like the end of a treasure hunt where you open up the chest and it's just full of sand.
Wait.
Go to the day Mr.
Nunez claims he did the transfer, March 21st.
Oh, my God.
$25 million.
Whoa.
That's some expensive sand.
Looks like it came into the account the day before at 8:34 in the morning, and then Hector transferred it out.
A secret $25 million transfer that got him killed.
What the hell was Cordero into? - Right.
- Any luck? No.
I just talked to the head of Suisse Federal Bank.
Given international banking regulations, there's no way to tell where that money came from or were it went.
Of if the money's even Cordero's.
He could have been moving it for someone else.
Sir, if this transaction was somehow responsible for Cordero's death and we can't track it, then we may never be able to find his killer.
There may be another way.
$25 million? That's right.
And your informant went to a great deal of trouble to keep it secret.
And you have no idea where the money came from? No, but odds are it's what got him killed.
Elizabeth, if you know anything about this Of course I don't know anything about this.
You don't believe me.
Do you blame me? I didn't know.
And given the lengths he went to hide the transaction, he clearly didn't want me to know.
Okay, fine.
Then I'm gonna need access to Peter Cordero's wire recordings.
For what? Because there may be something on those tapes that's relevant to his murder.
We went through them.
If there was anything on there, we would have heard it.
Not if you weren't listening for it.
I'm sorry, Victoria, but those wire recordings are a privileged part of a confidential investigation.
I can't give you access.
"Can't" or "won't"? Do you think I'm blind? Bringing down someone as big as Berman, you'd be able to write your own ticket.
The Mayor's Office, Attorney General everything you always dreamed of.
But you need Cordero's testimony, and if he was involved in anything dirty while acting as a witness, it'd jeopardize your whole case.
That's why you won't give us those tapes because you're afraid of what we might find.
Taking down a shark like Berman would send a signal to every fraudulent actor in the financial market.
I have to think about the greater good.
Oh, is that what you tell yourself so you can sleep at night? You could never play the game, could you? It's why you're stuck behind a desk instead of running the entire force down at 1 P.
P.
I am not stuck anywhere.
And I will never, never apologize for doing my job to the letter of the law.
Now, I'm gonna need those wire recordings.
Or do I have to go over your head? Anything that you find, you bring it to me first.
Do you understand? I will not have you screw up another one of my investigations.
Let's not put her on the list.
Yeah.
I feel bad for Gates.
My sisters could never work together.
I tell you, when the two of them went at it whoo! I wouldn't mind going at it with Gates' sister.
Oh, yeah? How'd you like having Gates as your sister-in-law? What? I think I got something.
So, on March 21st, Peter Cordero's wire picked up a phone call from Hector Nunez to confirm that the transfer was done.
The call came in at 9:25 A.
M.
That's pretty much what Hector said.
Yeah, but listen to the next two calls that Peter makes.
He's saying, "I'm calling on behalf of Armando Garcia.
" "I want to make sure that his money was received.
" "Can you confirm the amount?" Then he says, "thank you," and then hangs up.
Who's Armando Garcia? I checked with JP Harding, but they don't have any clients by that name.
So it wasn't company business? No.
Now listen to the second call.
Is he in? It's Peter Cordero calling.
Hey, everything's taken care of, but we're running out of time.
We need to get this done in the next couple days.
Is that gonna be a problem? Good.
"Everything's taken care of" that must be about the $25 million.
But what exactly was getting done in the next couple of days? And how did it get him killed? We need to find Armando Garcia.
Yeah.
Unfortunately, it's a pretty common name.
There are hundreds of Armando Garcias in the U.
S.
alone.
It's gonna be hard to narrow it down.
Unless we can find out who he was calling.
At 9:25, Peter would have been at work.
He would've made those phone calls from his desk phone.
If we can get those phone records, they could tell us what he was involved in.
I'll put in for a warrant.
Hopefully, we'll get it by morning.
You know, I was thinking about Gates' sister, and it got me wondering do you have any family I don't know about? I don't think so.
Good.
Because this "intimate wedding" of ours Oh, no.
You too? - How bad is yours? - I've got over 100.
I'm at 300 over that.
Well, to be fair, I am world-famous ish.
Uh, look, it's a first draft.
It just needs some editing.
Brutal, ruthless editing.
Castle, Michael Connelly? You haven't seen him in over a year.
Do you not remember what he wrote about your last book? No.
I think we got our first edit.
Uh, well, I have to invite Connelly, because if he finds out that Jonathan Kellerman made the cut and I have to invite Kellerman because I have to invite Wes Craven and Stephen King.
Yeah, but we got to start somewhere.
Well, I think I know where.
Aunt Theresa? Really? After what she posted about me on Facebook? She took it down.
Fine.
What are we gonna do? We can't have 500 people at the wedding.
Hello, you two.
Ah, help has arrived in the form of a neutral third party.
Someone who was born to be brutal and ruthless.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Aha! Oh, still working on the invite list, I see.
Yes, actually.
And would you mind joining us? Love to.
Let me get my list.
Oh, you know, I had no idea how many people I needed to invite until I wrote them all down.
Mm.
Good news.
I crossed-referenced my mother's list with my list.
We have three names in common.
Wow, three names.
That's great.
That takes us from, what, 585 to 582? There's got to be a better way to cut this down.
Ryan, you guys kept your wedding small.
What was it like 100 people? Yeah, that's all we could afford.
How did you contain the list? I have a lot of relatives who hate me now.
So, the warrant on Cordero's phone finally came through.
Whoever this Armando Garcia is, it has something to do with Venezuela.
That's where Peter was from.
Yeah, that first call confirming the $25 million? It was made to a bank in Venezuela.
The second call was to the Venezuela Consulate right here in the city.
It was the direct line of a senior official there a Luis Delgado.
Clandestine wire transfers, a high-ranking consulate official, all circling around the mysterious Armando Garcia.
What was Cordero doing? I don't know, but I can't wait to find out.
Swiss bank accounts, secret money transfers it's got international intrigue written all over it.
It was just a simple passport request.
A passport request? Yes, that's why he called.
Well, what about the money? I'm afraid I don't know anything about any money.
Really? I suppose you've never heard of Armando Garcia, either? Armando Garcia? Yes, of course I heard of Armando Garcia.
You have? That's who I got the passport for.
Wait, I thought that the passport was for Peter Cordero.
Yes, Peter Cordero, Armando Garcia it's the same guy.
He changed his name to fit in.
But his birth name was Armando Garcia.
He was sending the money to himself.
You said he was requesting a passport.
A Venezuelan passport? Yes, of course.
Cordero applied to re-establish his Venezuelan citizenship, and we were more than happy to oblige.
Under the name "Armando Garcia"? That's right.
But, uh there was something odd about his request.
He asked to pick up the passport in Mexico City.
Mexico City? Did he say why? No, but he was supposed to get it yesterday at our embassy there.
He had booked a flight from Mexico City to Caracas that night.
He was running away? Not just running away, changing his identity completely.
He never intended to testify.
He was just stringing my sister along until he could escape.
All he had to do was drive to Mexico.
Once he boarded that flight to Caracas under his new identity, paid for with a new credit card, Peter Cordero would cease to exist.
Your sister would never find him.
But he wasn't gonna leave empty-handed, so he made one last desperate deal.
The night he was killed, he was preparing to disappear forever along with the $25 million.
You don't just conjure $25 million out of thin air.
It came from somewhere.
And, given the circumstances, nowhere legal.
If you're right, it'll destroy my sister's case.
All his testimony will be tainted.
Sir, what do you want us to do? Find the truth.
In order to do that, we need to know where the money came from, and there's no way to find out.
Uh, maybe there is.
You know that secret Armando Garcia credit card? You know, the one he used to buy the plane ticket? We found another charge on it for a computer station he rented at an Internet cafe.
He was there the exact same time that $25 million showed up in his account.
So whatever he was doing there was related to the transfer.
That cafe has security video.
If we can get a look at the computer screen or Peter's fingers on the keyboard, maybe we can figure out where that money came from.
And why he was killed.
Sir, uh you okay? Oh, just trying to figure out how to tell my sister her case is compromised without her blaming me.
Why would she blame you when you're just doing you job? There's a history.
Mm.
I had just been made head of Internal Affairs.
Elizabeth was in the D.
A.
's office.
We called ourselves "the dynamic duo.
" At the time, Elizabeth was closing in on a heroin ring in East New York, and they had an undercover inside.
His testimony was key to the case, but He was dirty? He skimmed a few eight balls off the very bust Elizabeth was building her case around.
And when my office caught him re-selling it, she came to me, begged me not to file charges, asked me to think of the greater good.
I did my job that day, too.
Hasn't been the same between us since.
Security video is in.
There's Cordero.
But the angle is over the monitor.
- We can't see the screen.
- Or the keyboard.
There's no way to tell what he's doing.
Wait a minute.
Wait.
Who is that? Take a look at the time code.
It's right around the moment the $25 million got into Cordero's Swiss bank account.
It's him.
He transferred the money to Cordero.
A covert transfer from an untraceable I.
P.
address, paid for under an alias.
These people took extraordinary measures to keep from being discovered.
Zoom in.
Freeze it.
Wait.
That's Cordero's boss.
That's Jamie Berman.
Why would Berman secretly pay Cordero $25 million? Only one reason.
Cordero must have told Berman about the U.
S.
Attorney's investigation.
And Berman was paying him to throw the case.
If Berman was paying Cordero to throw the case, then the recordings from his wire were all lies.
Berman was feeding the U.
S.
Attorney's Office false evidence.
And if Elizabeth was building her case on that, she would have been torn apart by the defense.
Keeping her out of Berman's business for quite a while, if not forever.
All this time, my sister thought she was taking down Berman when he was really trying to take down her.
The one thing it doesn't explain, though, is why Cordero was killed.
Berman's up to his eyeballs in this.
You bring him in here and find out what he knows.
Yes, sir.
I'm afraid you're mistaken, detective.
I didn't transfer any money to Mr.
Cordero, certainly not $25 million.
And yet, the moment that you press that button, $25 million showed up in Cordero's account.
You have no evidence that account belongs to Mr.
Cordero, just as you have no evidence that money came from my client.
Then why were you with him in that Internet cafe? They have good coffee.
I think there's a reason why you went out of you way to keep that transfer a secret.
I think Cordero told you that he was being forced to be an informant for the U.
S.
Attorney.
And knowing that he would never be able to work again, he struck a deal with you.
$25 million in exchange for providing false evidence to undermine the investigation.
What investigation? You know exactly what investigation.
And when you found out that he wasn't gonna finish the job that he was gonna leave town and take your money with him you had him killed.
And then you took the wire that you knew he was wearing to cover up any recorded evidence of the murder.
That's all wild speculation.
Not to mention, you have your facts wrong.
You said Peter was wearing his wire when he was killed.
I'm afraid that's not possible.
So you knew about the wire? You admit you were in on it with him.
Jamie.
It's not illegal to know.
And I guarantee you you will never link me to that payment, so you'll never be able to prove witness tampering.
But, yeah, I knew about the wire.
And Peter wasn't wearing it when he was killed because he had already left it for the feds at the dead drop at Lafayette and Spring.
How do you even The walk that you took together.
You were with him.
I saw him go into the Mailbox door and put it into one of those boxes.
Thank you for coming.
Of course.
There's been a break in the case? Yes, actually.
New information has surfaced about Peter Cordero's murder.
In fact, it seems someone in the U.
S.
Attorney's Office lied about Cordero not leaving his wire at the dead drop the night of his death.
No one lied.
I went to the drop myself.
It wasn't there.
Elizabeth? Tell her.
Stefanie, if Peter never turned in his wire, how did that day's recordings end up on your computer? See, even though you erased them, the tech department here was able to recover everything.
I don't know what you're talking about.
Standard procedure was to turn them over for analysis the next morning.
But you listened to those tapes that night, and you heard something you weren't supposed to, at least not until Cordero was gone.
I came to the U.
S.
believing in the American dream.
So I worked hard and tried to be honest in a corrupt world, working for corrupt and greedy people, because I still believed.
But when you, the U.
S.
Government, plants drugs on me, threatens to destroy my future, all because you need someone to testify, how am I supposed to still believe? I did everything I could to play by the rules, but no one else does.
So by the time you hear this, I'll be gone.
We brought in the cop that busted Cordero.
He confessed to planting the cocaine on your orders.
Why, Stefanie? You said you needed someone on the inside, to make the case against Berman, for the greater good.
No.
Not like this.
When you heard that recording and found out Peter was leaving, you knew it would all come out.
So you went to his place.
I I went to try and talk to him, but he wouldn't listen.
And then you saw his gun, and you made sure that his story would never get out.
And then you made it look like he was killed for that recording.
Detective Beckett, Mr.
Castle.
I would like to commend you for your exemplary work in the face of head winds from me and my office.
Oh, thank you.
But, I mean, we were just all doing our jobs, following our Captain's lead.
Did you manage to track down that $25 million? Yes, it turns out that Mr.
Cordero donated a large portion of it to rebuild his hometown the one that was destroyed in the earthquake that killed his parents.
Are you gonna try to recover it? Well, it's very difficult to reclaim funds once they've left the country.
Think that we have better uses for our resources.
I should be going, but thank you again.
What about Berman? Do you still have a case? Well, not the one that I thought, but at least I won't embarrass myself in court presenting evidence that's untrue.
Then Berman paid $25 million for nothing.
Bet that hurt.
Probably, but it's not enough.
We will build our case the right way.
It may take some time, but we'll get him.
Thank you, Victoria.
For what? For doing your job so well.
So, I know it's it's late and you probably want to get home, but after today, I could really use a drink and a sister.
Me too.
You know, in the end, Gates' sister wasn't that bad.
Does that mean we have to invite her to the wedding? Yeah, what about that our lists? Castle, we can't have that many people coming.
Agreed.
So, what do we do? I think we have to decide why we're actually having this wedding.
I mean, are we doing this not to insult hundreds of people or are we doing this for us? Well, for us.
Well, then, why don't we just take a minute and write down the names of all the people that absolutely, positively have to be there, no matter what, to make us happy? One minute.
Yeah.
That's not much time.
What if we forget someone? Then they shouldn't have been invited in the first place.
Let's do it.
Okay.
All right.
- Are we ready? - Yep.
One minute.
And go.
You stopped writing.
So did you.
Of course I'm going to have to invite my mother and Alexis.
- Yeah, and my dad and aunt Theresa.
- Right.
Espo and Ryan, who will bring Jenny.
Mm-hmm.
Lanie.
Lanie.
I'm gonna have to invite the poker group.
- Yeah, Maddie.
- Gates.
Ooh! And Gates' family.
How much fun would that be? And talk about an appropriate, if not slightly on-the-nose metaphor a bride and groom together, side-by-side, as they go through the ups and downs, the twists and turns, and the loop-de-loops of life.
Castle, I love you, but I will not marry you on a ride or up in space or on a slide.
Bet Dr.
Seuss got married somewhere fun.
Yes, his wife's living room.
How many people do you think can fit in one of those roller-coaster cars, anyway? You know, that's a good point.
We should determine exactly whom we are going to invite.
Yeah, good idea.
That way we can determine exactly how big a roller-coaster car we need to build.
Or how big of an actual venue we need.
Either way, I'll go and get the paper.
I'll get a pen.
And I will get the phone.
Beckett.
You know, there's a good argument for keeping the list really small.
Just immediate family.
This argument doesn't have something to do with a certain amusement park ride, does it? I'm being serious.
Getting married is an intimate act, and our ceremony should reflect that intimacy.
And that way, we could all fit into one car.
Ryan, how do you feel about roller coasters? Ooh, make me nauseous.
Why? No reason.
Who's our victim? Peter Cordero, 26.
According to the super, he lives alone.
He's a future's trader at JP Harding, the Wall Street investment firm.
And how was he killed? Uh, single GSW to the chest.
Looks like his own future got traded.
Yeah, not without a fight first.
Who found the body? Well, that's an interesting question.
At 10:03 P.
M.
, a woman made a 911 call from a pay phone down the block, but she refused to leave her name.
A pay phone down the block? But how would she know he was dead unless Unless she was in the apartment.
Well, lividity places the time of death between 8:00 and 10:00, so if the 911 call came in at 10:03 She could be our killer.
Esposito's checking security-cam footage.
Hopefully, we caught her on tape.
Now, is it just me, or is it odd that our victim is wearing a suit jacket, tie, pants, shoes, but his shirt is unbuttoned? It's odd, all right.
And look at this his shirt was on and buttoned when he was shot.
So our killer unbuttoned his shirt after he was dead.
Yep.
The killer was looking for something.
A pricy necklace or oh, a bunch of cash taped to his chest like "Wolf of Wall Street.
" There's something else.
I didn't find any defensive wounds, so if there was a fight out there, I don't think this guy was in it.
Yo, Beckett.
There are no security cameras in the lobby, but I found one in a liquor store down the street.
It got a shot of that pay phone right when the 911 call came in.
Okay.
Canvas the neighbors.
See if anyone saw her in the building.
Did you talk to next of kin yet? Well, the guy didn't have any immediate family, but he did list a cousin in Queens, a Maria Cordero, as his in-case-of-emergency.
All right, bring her in.
Let's see if she recognizes the woman in the photo.
Castle and I will go to his place of work and see what they know there.
All right.
No.
No.
I'm sorry.
I don't know her.
Maria, did your cousin say anything about having a girlfriend? No.
He said he didn't have time.
Work was his life.
Were the two of you close? Peter was like my brother.
When he was 10, his parents died in the big earthquake in Venezuela.
My parents adopted him and brought him to the States.
Did Peter say anything about having any enemies? No.
Peter was a sweet guy.
He never forgot where he came from not like those privileged, silver-spoon types he worked with.
He was a scholarship kid, so everything he got was through hard work.
When did you talk to him last? A few days ago.
And how did he seem? Stressed, actually.
Did he say what about? No.
I I don't know.
When I asked him, he said something happened at work, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle.
JP Harding Investment Bank.
This place is either the engine of capitalism or the poster child of greed and corruption, depending on which paper you read.
Maybe the invisible hand of the market killed Peter.
It would explain the lack of defensive wounds.
You know, prep-school buddy of mine came to work here out of college.
He made a quarter of a billion dollars before he was 30, retired, and bought an island.
Wait.
He owns his own island? We should definitely invite him to the wedding.
Excuse me.
Hi, I'm detective Beckett.
We need to speak with Peter Cordero's boss.
Jamie Berman, I believe? Can I tell him what it's regarding? Killing are you capable of it? Because if you are, I will make you rich.
Goldman just poached Consolidated's pension account from us this morning, so I am offering a bounty.
Neal? A million dollars to the first son of a bitch at this table to poach an account back from Goldman.
It's open season, guys open-hunting season.
I want you to make them bleed! Excuse me.
All right, let's go! Excuse me, Mr.
Berman.
Detective Beckett.
Could we have a word, please? I told you S.
E.
C.
pricks to talk to my lawyer.
I'm not S.
E.
C.
I'm NYPD homicide.
Homicide? I apologize for the theatrics, detective, but in this world, it gets results.
And here I thought the stories of Wall Street excess were exaggerated.
Mr.
Berman, I understand that Peter Cordero reported directly to you.
Yes, he was my best commodities' trader.
And one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet.
In this part of the world, anyway.
Do you have any leads? Uh, just one.
Do you recognize this woman? No.
I'm afraid I don't.
Well, according to Peter Cordero's family, he was having some trouble here at work.
Do you have any idea what that might have been? No idea.
In fact, he was having one of the best months he's ever had.
And what about his clients? Any problems there? Well, Pete was a rising star.
His clients loved him But But what? Last week, I was taking the stairs to the 65th floor my version of exercise and I saw Peter in the stairwell with this guy who looked like a gangbanger.
All tatted up his neck, big scar on his cheek.
Not the kind of guy you ever see down here.
And he was handing Peter a package about yea big.
When Peter saw me, he looked guilty as hell.
So I just kept walking.
And you didn't ask him about it? Yeah, I did later, but he said it was nothing, so I just let it go.
You saw a gangbanger in your stairwell, and you just let it go? This is a high-stress environment, detective.
We don't ask a lot of questions about what our people do to to get through the day.
Okay.
Do you think you can describe him to a sketch artist? I think so.
Great.
I need the names of all of Peter's associates here at work.
Of course.
Lanie's got something for us.
Still no indication of defensive wounds, but I did find this when I checked his nails for DNA.
Numbers.
"7, 2, 3, 5, 9, 8.
" He wrote it in pen I'd say four or five days ago.
But that's not why I called you.
Look at this.
On his chest, next to the "Y" incision.
- Look at what? - It's subtle so subtle, I almost missed it.
But I think it explains why his shirt was ripped open.
- You see this grainy material? - Yeah.
It's adhesive residue.
In fact, there's a residue pattern from his belly to his chest.
Adhesive? Mm-hmm.
Looking at the pattern, I'd say your Wall Street wolf was wearing a wire.
A wire? Yes, sir.
We believe our killer removed it from the victim's body after shooting him.
Do we know who he was wearing a wire for? Well, we're checking with other branches of law enforcement right now.
What about this woman who called in the murder? Have you been able to identify her? You know, no one in Cordero's life seems to know who she is, and we have no idea where to find her.
I think she just found us.
Oh, Lord.
I'd say your case just got a lot more complicated.
What is it, sir? They're from the U.
S.
Attorney's Office.
You know them? Uh, not the woman from the photo, but the woman with her is Elizabeth Weston, the U.
S.
Attorney for the Southern District.
She also happens to be my sister.
Castle 6x19 - The Greater Good Original air date March 24, 2014 Victoria.
Been a while.
Yes, it has.
And who is this? I'm Stefanie Goldmark, Assistant U.
S.
Attorney.
We're here about the Cordero murder.
Oh, well, that's funny, because we have a few questions about that ourselves.
Starting, Ms.
Goldmark, with why you didn't identify yourself when you made that 911 call from the pay phone.
Because I instructed her not to.
I couldn't afford to compromise our investigation.
What investigation? Is there somewhere private we can talk? All right, Elizabeth, what's this all about? Your victim was a confidential informant for my office in an ongoing criminal investigation of JP Harding.
Which is why Cordero was wearing a wire.
Yes, and since JP Harding is on the 65th floor, we couldn't monitor it live.
Cordero put it on every morning and turned it in every night, along with the attached recording device.
Only last night, he didn't.
I went to his apartment to see what happened.
That's when I found him, and the wire was gone.
We think that there was something key to our investigation on that wire and that's why he was killed.
So where are you on leads? Well, uh, ballistics is running the slug, but right now the only lead is this sketch, provided by Mr.
Cordero's boss, Jamie Berman.
It's of a man he saw with our victim.
Well, I wouldn't put much credence in that sketch.
Why? Why is that? Because Berman is the target of our investigation.
Jamie Berman, head of JP Harding? We've been trying to mount a case against him for years insider trading, securities fraud.
We know he's doing it.
We just haven't been able to get proof.
Not without getting inside.
Berman's too careful.
Then, last month, we caught a break.
Peter Cordero was found with a baggie of cocaine during a stop-and-frisk.
With his priors for possession when he was a teen, he was facing 5 to 10.
You got Cordero to play ball.
He jumped at an immunity deal.
He'd already gotten valuable information on his wire recordings.
But yesterday, he was scheduled to meet with Berman one-on-one.
He was gonna push him to open up about some of his deals.
Cordero may have pushed too hard.
We think Berman made Cordero in that meeting.
So you think Jamie Berman's somehow responsible for Cordero's death? Well, if Berman knew he had incriminated himself on tape He'd go to any lengths to get it back.
Victoria, this investigation is ongoing, and exposing it to Mr.
Berman or anyone at JP Harding would break federal statutes.
But I thought that this was something that you and your team needed to know.
I'd certainly say so.
So I trust that you will keep my office in the loop if there are any significant developments.
Is that clear? Of course.
Sir, I didn't I didn't know you had a sister.
Oh, well, now you do.
U.
S.
Attorney for the Southern District? That's a really big deal.
Why hasn't Gates ever mentioned her before? I don't know, but there was definitely a subtle chill between the two of them.
"A subtle chill"? More like a polar vortex.
I'm guessing something happened between them in the past something deeply personal that Gates does not want us to know about.
I'll give you a dollar if you ask her.
- No way.
- Come on.
Aren't you curious? Yeah, but I like my job too much.
Hey, so, uh, there may be something to the U.
S.
Attorney's theory.
I checked Cordero's calendar.
He was scheduled to meet with Berman at 5:00 P.
M.
yesterday.
And whatever they talked about, it got heated.
How do you know that? According to building security, the two of them left shortly after and seemed to be in the middle of a fight.
Yeah, Peter and I had words yesterday.
So what? So, you didn't tell us about that - when we talked this morning.
- 'Cause it wasn't relevant.
How is it not relevant? The video shows you leaving together.
Two hours later, he's dead.
It's not relevant because I didn't kill him.
Honestly, detective, what would be my motive? What exactly were the two of you arguing about? A business deal.
You looked pretty worked up for a business deal.
There was a lot riding on it.
What was the deal? Client confidentiality, detective.
I'm not at liberty to discuss it.
You had a meeting with Peter before that.
What were you speaking about then? Other financial matters.
What kind of financial matters? Sensitive ones, any discussion of which, even with law enforcement, would be considered insider trading.
So unless you have a subpoena Who else was at the meeting? Just the two of us.
And what did you do after you left the lobby? Oh, we walked up Lafayette and parted ways around Spring.
What time was that? Around 6:15.
Where were you between 8:00 and 10:00? At my usual table at Le Cirque.
Feel free to check.
It's time.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a conference call with the Fed.
Oh, and if you want to talk to me again, detective, call my lawyer.
Le Cirque confirms that Berman was there from 8:00 P.
M.
till 10:25.
Couldn't have been him.
'Cause a guy like Berman isn't gonna get his hands dirty.
He's gonna hire someone.
No, your sister's right.
Berman is behind this.
And speaking of your sister Let's not.
If Berman is behind this, he will do everything he can to protect himself.
Knowing that the feds are watching him, he would be careful to cover his tracks.
It's gonna be next to impossible to trace this back to him.
So, all we're really sure of is that the sketch he gave us is a load of fictitious crap meant to send us in the wrong direction.
It's not as fictitious as you think.
I just got the ballistics back on the bullet that killed Cordero.
Striations match a slug that was pulled from a robbery shooting at a bodega in the Bronx three months ago.
The detectives couldn't make a case, but their three best suspects were gang members, including this guy.
Same guy.
Same gun.
Hector Nunez? Yeah, runs the South Bronx territory of Los Caballeros gang.
Priors include assault, attempted manslaughter, and conspiracy to distribute cocaine.
No, you're wrong.
Peter had nothing to do with cocaine.
He hated drugs.
Do you know he was arrested last month for possession? That's impossible.
I know Peter.
He'd never use that stuff.
Are you sure, Maria? Because he was seen receiving a package last week from this guy.
No.
No.
It it can't be.
Do you recognize him? Hector Nunez.
He was Peter's best friend growing up.
But then he got mixed up in a gang, and he tried to drag Peter in, too.
Afterwards, Hector changed.
He became dangerous.
Peter cut ties with him over a decade ago.
Can you think of any reason why he'd be back in Peter's life? Hector was a devil.
Peter would have never gotten mixed up with him again unless he didn't have a choice.
This is a long way from Wall Street.
This doesn't make any sense.
If Peter was into drugs, he had enough money to get them from downtown.
Why would he risk getting them from someone that he knew was dangerous? There it is El Baile Club.
Yeah, unofficial headquarters of Los Caballeros.
Stick close.
If Hector's as dangerous as advertised, things might get a little hairy.
"Hairy's" my middle name.
That sounded a lot better in my head.
Are you sure this is the right place? Those guys don't look very dangerous.
What about those guys? Ah, you mean the heavily-armed ones.
We're looking for Hector Nunez.
Beckett.
Hector Nunez? Detective Beckett, NYPD.
Detective, you shouldn't be here.
You could get hurt.
It's a dangerous neighborhood.
Yeah, well, maybe I should take you down to my neighborhood.
Let me save you some time.
Whatever it is, I didn't do it.
And I suppose you've never heard of a Peter Cordero, either.
What about Peter? He's dead.
Who did this? Well, we were thinking you might be able to tell us.
I'd never hurt Peter.
He was my best friend.
When we were kids and the gang wanted to take him, I wouldn't let them.
I knew he could do better.
So how did he end up shot and killed with your gun? Something was going on with him.
He called me last week first time in years.
Said he was into some deal that was gonna make him rich, but it was dangerous.
In case something went wrong, he needed to protect himself.
He said he need a weapon.
You're saying you gave him that gun? Well, he said he couldn't buy one himself 'cause he was being watched all the time.
Was that what was in the package you gave him in the stairwell? Yeah.
That deal that he was into was it drugs? Not drugs, money.
Something to do with bank accounts.
"Bank accounts"? Last Thursday night, he came to me, said he needed one last favor.
He wanted me to take an envelope to a manager at some bank in Midtown Suisse Federal or something.
Why couldn't he just do it himself? Why would he need you? Said he couldn't afford to be seen at the bank was too risky.
What was in the envelope? He said something about transfer instructions.
It was sealed, but there was a bank account number written on the outside.
Do you remember the number? Wrote it down in case something went wrong.
I guess it did.
Not the same six-digit number that was on his hand.
After I took the envelope to the bank, I called Peter at work to confirm it was done.
That's the last time we talked.
Hector's alibi checks out.
He was at Lady of Mercy nursing home visiting his mom when Peter was killed.
Mysterious financial transactions, a deal so dangerous he needed a gun seems to me there's a lot more to your sister's star witness than she knew.
"Than she knew" or than she chose to tell us about? Sir? Yo.
Talked to the manager at Suisse Federal.
He confirmed that a bank account with those numbers exists, but he refused to give out any information on it.
Did he at least acknowledge it was Peter Cordero's account? He couldn't, because he didn't know himself.
It's a numbered account set up for privacy, so the only way that anyone can access it is with a password.
So there's no way to know what Cordero was doing.
No.
Unless Six digits? Seems kind of password-y to me.
Okay, read it to me.
Come on.
We're in.
Castle, you've done it again.
What's it say? The balance is zero dollars.
Zero dollars? That doesn't seem very dangerous.
Feels like the end of a treasure hunt where you open up the chest and it's just full of sand.
Wait.
Go to the day Mr.
Nunez claims he did the transfer, March 21st.
Oh, my God.
$25 million.
Whoa.
That's some expensive sand.
Looks like it came into the account the day before at 8:34 in the morning, and then Hector transferred it out.
A secret $25 million transfer that got him killed.
What the hell was Cordero into? - Right.
- Any luck? No.
I just talked to the head of Suisse Federal Bank.
Given international banking regulations, there's no way to tell where that money came from or were it went.
Of if the money's even Cordero's.
He could have been moving it for someone else.
Sir, if this transaction was somehow responsible for Cordero's death and we can't track it, then we may never be able to find his killer.
There may be another way.
$25 million? That's right.
And your informant went to a great deal of trouble to keep it secret.
And you have no idea where the money came from? No, but odds are it's what got him killed.
Elizabeth, if you know anything about this Of course I don't know anything about this.
You don't believe me.
Do you blame me? I didn't know.
And given the lengths he went to hide the transaction, he clearly didn't want me to know.
Okay, fine.
Then I'm gonna need access to Peter Cordero's wire recordings.
For what? Because there may be something on those tapes that's relevant to his murder.
We went through them.
If there was anything on there, we would have heard it.
Not if you weren't listening for it.
I'm sorry, Victoria, but those wire recordings are a privileged part of a confidential investigation.
I can't give you access.
"Can't" or "won't"? Do you think I'm blind? Bringing down someone as big as Berman, you'd be able to write your own ticket.
The Mayor's Office, Attorney General everything you always dreamed of.
But you need Cordero's testimony, and if he was involved in anything dirty while acting as a witness, it'd jeopardize your whole case.
That's why you won't give us those tapes because you're afraid of what we might find.
Taking down a shark like Berman would send a signal to every fraudulent actor in the financial market.
I have to think about the greater good.
Oh, is that what you tell yourself so you can sleep at night? You could never play the game, could you? It's why you're stuck behind a desk instead of running the entire force down at 1 P.
P.
I am not stuck anywhere.
And I will never, never apologize for doing my job to the letter of the law.
Now, I'm gonna need those wire recordings.
Or do I have to go over your head? Anything that you find, you bring it to me first.
Do you understand? I will not have you screw up another one of my investigations.
Let's not put her on the list.
Yeah.
I feel bad for Gates.
My sisters could never work together.
I tell you, when the two of them went at it whoo! I wouldn't mind going at it with Gates' sister.
Oh, yeah? How'd you like having Gates as your sister-in-law? What? I think I got something.
So, on March 21st, Peter Cordero's wire picked up a phone call from Hector Nunez to confirm that the transfer was done.
The call came in at 9:25 A.
M.
That's pretty much what Hector said.
Yeah, but listen to the next two calls that Peter makes.
He's saying, "I'm calling on behalf of Armando Garcia.
" "I want to make sure that his money was received.
" "Can you confirm the amount?" Then he says, "thank you," and then hangs up.
Who's Armando Garcia? I checked with JP Harding, but they don't have any clients by that name.
So it wasn't company business? No.
Now listen to the second call.
Is he in? It's Peter Cordero calling.
Hey, everything's taken care of, but we're running out of time.
We need to get this done in the next couple days.
Is that gonna be a problem? Good.
"Everything's taken care of" that must be about the $25 million.
But what exactly was getting done in the next couple of days? And how did it get him killed? We need to find Armando Garcia.
Yeah.
Unfortunately, it's a pretty common name.
There are hundreds of Armando Garcias in the U.
S.
alone.
It's gonna be hard to narrow it down.
Unless we can find out who he was calling.
At 9:25, Peter would have been at work.
He would've made those phone calls from his desk phone.
If we can get those phone records, they could tell us what he was involved in.
I'll put in for a warrant.
Hopefully, we'll get it by morning.
You know, I was thinking about Gates' sister, and it got me wondering do you have any family I don't know about? I don't think so.
Good.
Because this "intimate wedding" of ours Oh, no.
You too? - How bad is yours? - I've got over 100.
I'm at 300 over that.
Well, to be fair, I am world-famous ish.
Uh, look, it's a first draft.
It just needs some editing.
Brutal, ruthless editing.
Castle, Michael Connelly? You haven't seen him in over a year.
Do you not remember what he wrote about your last book? No.
I think we got our first edit.
Uh, well, I have to invite Connelly, because if he finds out that Jonathan Kellerman made the cut and I have to invite Kellerman because I have to invite Wes Craven and Stephen King.
Yeah, but we got to start somewhere.
Well, I think I know where.
Aunt Theresa? Really? After what she posted about me on Facebook? She took it down.
Fine.
What are we gonna do? We can't have 500 people at the wedding.
Hello, you two.
Ah, help has arrived in the form of a neutral third party.
Someone who was born to be brutal and ruthless.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Aha! Oh, still working on the invite list, I see.
Yes, actually.
And would you mind joining us? Love to.
Let me get my list.
Oh, you know, I had no idea how many people I needed to invite until I wrote them all down.
Mm.
Good news.
I crossed-referenced my mother's list with my list.
We have three names in common.
Wow, three names.
That's great.
That takes us from, what, 585 to 582? There's got to be a better way to cut this down.
Ryan, you guys kept your wedding small.
What was it like 100 people? Yeah, that's all we could afford.
How did you contain the list? I have a lot of relatives who hate me now.
So, the warrant on Cordero's phone finally came through.
Whoever this Armando Garcia is, it has something to do with Venezuela.
That's where Peter was from.
Yeah, that first call confirming the $25 million? It was made to a bank in Venezuela.
The second call was to the Venezuela Consulate right here in the city.
It was the direct line of a senior official there a Luis Delgado.
Clandestine wire transfers, a high-ranking consulate official, all circling around the mysterious Armando Garcia.
What was Cordero doing? I don't know, but I can't wait to find out.
Swiss bank accounts, secret money transfers it's got international intrigue written all over it.
It was just a simple passport request.
A passport request? Yes, that's why he called.
Well, what about the money? I'm afraid I don't know anything about any money.
Really? I suppose you've never heard of Armando Garcia, either? Armando Garcia? Yes, of course I heard of Armando Garcia.
You have? That's who I got the passport for.
Wait, I thought that the passport was for Peter Cordero.
Yes, Peter Cordero, Armando Garcia it's the same guy.
He changed his name to fit in.
But his birth name was Armando Garcia.
He was sending the money to himself.
You said he was requesting a passport.
A Venezuelan passport? Yes, of course.
Cordero applied to re-establish his Venezuelan citizenship, and we were more than happy to oblige.
Under the name "Armando Garcia"? That's right.
But, uh there was something odd about his request.
He asked to pick up the passport in Mexico City.
Mexico City? Did he say why? No, but he was supposed to get it yesterday at our embassy there.
He had booked a flight from Mexico City to Caracas that night.
He was running away? Not just running away, changing his identity completely.
He never intended to testify.
He was just stringing my sister along until he could escape.
All he had to do was drive to Mexico.
Once he boarded that flight to Caracas under his new identity, paid for with a new credit card, Peter Cordero would cease to exist.
Your sister would never find him.
But he wasn't gonna leave empty-handed, so he made one last desperate deal.
The night he was killed, he was preparing to disappear forever along with the $25 million.
You don't just conjure $25 million out of thin air.
It came from somewhere.
And, given the circumstances, nowhere legal.
If you're right, it'll destroy my sister's case.
All his testimony will be tainted.
Sir, what do you want us to do? Find the truth.
In order to do that, we need to know where the money came from, and there's no way to find out.
Uh, maybe there is.
You know that secret Armando Garcia credit card? You know, the one he used to buy the plane ticket? We found another charge on it for a computer station he rented at an Internet cafe.
He was there the exact same time that $25 million showed up in his account.
So whatever he was doing there was related to the transfer.
That cafe has security video.
If we can get a look at the computer screen or Peter's fingers on the keyboard, maybe we can figure out where that money came from.
And why he was killed.
Sir, uh you okay? Oh, just trying to figure out how to tell my sister her case is compromised without her blaming me.
Why would she blame you when you're just doing you job? There's a history.
Mm.
I had just been made head of Internal Affairs.
Elizabeth was in the D.
A.
's office.
We called ourselves "the dynamic duo.
" At the time, Elizabeth was closing in on a heroin ring in East New York, and they had an undercover inside.
His testimony was key to the case, but He was dirty? He skimmed a few eight balls off the very bust Elizabeth was building her case around.
And when my office caught him re-selling it, she came to me, begged me not to file charges, asked me to think of the greater good.
I did my job that day, too.
Hasn't been the same between us since.
Security video is in.
There's Cordero.
But the angle is over the monitor.
- We can't see the screen.
- Or the keyboard.
There's no way to tell what he's doing.
Wait a minute.
Wait.
Who is that? Take a look at the time code.
It's right around the moment the $25 million got into Cordero's Swiss bank account.
It's him.
He transferred the money to Cordero.
A covert transfer from an untraceable I.
P.
address, paid for under an alias.
These people took extraordinary measures to keep from being discovered.
Zoom in.
Freeze it.
Wait.
That's Cordero's boss.
That's Jamie Berman.
Why would Berman secretly pay Cordero $25 million? Only one reason.
Cordero must have told Berman about the U.
S.
Attorney's investigation.
And Berman was paying him to throw the case.
If Berman was paying Cordero to throw the case, then the recordings from his wire were all lies.
Berman was feeding the U.
S.
Attorney's Office false evidence.
And if Elizabeth was building her case on that, she would have been torn apart by the defense.
Keeping her out of Berman's business for quite a while, if not forever.
All this time, my sister thought she was taking down Berman when he was really trying to take down her.
The one thing it doesn't explain, though, is why Cordero was killed.
Berman's up to his eyeballs in this.
You bring him in here and find out what he knows.
Yes, sir.
I'm afraid you're mistaken, detective.
I didn't transfer any money to Mr.
Cordero, certainly not $25 million.
And yet, the moment that you press that button, $25 million showed up in Cordero's account.
You have no evidence that account belongs to Mr.
Cordero, just as you have no evidence that money came from my client.
Then why were you with him in that Internet cafe? They have good coffee.
I think there's a reason why you went out of you way to keep that transfer a secret.
I think Cordero told you that he was being forced to be an informant for the U.
S.
Attorney.
And knowing that he would never be able to work again, he struck a deal with you.
$25 million in exchange for providing false evidence to undermine the investigation.
What investigation? You know exactly what investigation.
And when you found out that he wasn't gonna finish the job that he was gonna leave town and take your money with him you had him killed.
And then you took the wire that you knew he was wearing to cover up any recorded evidence of the murder.
That's all wild speculation.
Not to mention, you have your facts wrong.
You said Peter was wearing his wire when he was killed.
I'm afraid that's not possible.
So you knew about the wire? You admit you were in on it with him.
Jamie.
It's not illegal to know.
And I guarantee you you will never link me to that payment, so you'll never be able to prove witness tampering.
But, yeah, I knew about the wire.
And Peter wasn't wearing it when he was killed because he had already left it for the feds at the dead drop at Lafayette and Spring.
How do you even The walk that you took together.
You were with him.
I saw him go into the Mailbox door and put it into one of those boxes.
Thank you for coming.
Of course.
There's been a break in the case? Yes, actually.
New information has surfaced about Peter Cordero's murder.
In fact, it seems someone in the U.
S.
Attorney's Office lied about Cordero not leaving his wire at the dead drop the night of his death.
No one lied.
I went to the drop myself.
It wasn't there.
Elizabeth? Tell her.
Stefanie, if Peter never turned in his wire, how did that day's recordings end up on your computer? See, even though you erased them, the tech department here was able to recover everything.
I don't know what you're talking about.
Standard procedure was to turn them over for analysis the next morning.
But you listened to those tapes that night, and you heard something you weren't supposed to, at least not until Cordero was gone.
I came to the U.
S.
believing in the American dream.
So I worked hard and tried to be honest in a corrupt world, working for corrupt and greedy people, because I still believed.
But when you, the U.
S.
Government, plants drugs on me, threatens to destroy my future, all because you need someone to testify, how am I supposed to still believe? I did everything I could to play by the rules, but no one else does.
So by the time you hear this, I'll be gone.
We brought in the cop that busted Cordero.
He confessed to planting the cocaine on your orders.
Why, Stefanie? You said you needed someone on the inside, to make the case against Berman, for the greater good.
No.
Not like this.
When you heard that recording and found out Peter was leaving, you knew it would all come out.
So you went to his place.
I I went to try and talk to him, but he wouldn't listen.
And then you saw his gun, and you made sure that his story would never get out.
And then you made it look like he was killed for that recording.
Detective Beckett, Mr.
Castle.
I would like to commend you for your exemplary work in the face of head winds from me and my office.
Oh, thank you.
But, I mean, we were just all doing our jobs, following our Captain's lead.
Did you manage to track down that $25 million? Yes, it turns out that Mr.
Cordero donated a large portion of it to rebuild his hometown the one that was destroyed in the earthquake that killed his parents.
Are you gonna try to recover it? Well, it's very difficult to reclaim funds once they've left the country.
Think that we have better uses for our resources.
I should be going, but thank you again.
What about Berman? Do you still have a case? Well, not the one that I thought, but at least I won't embarrass myself in court presenting evidence that's untrue.
Then Berman paid $25 million for nothing.
Bet that hurt.
Probably, but it's not enough.
We will build our case the right way.
It may take some time, but we'll get him.
Thank you, Victoria.
For what? For doing your job so well.
So, I know it's it's late and you probably want to get home, but after today, I could really use a drink and a sister.
Me too.
You know, in the end, Gates' sister wasn't that bad.
Does that mean we have to invite her to the wedding? Yeah, what about that our lists? Castle, we can't have that many people coming.
Agreed.
So, what do we do? I think we have to decide why we're actually having this wedding.
I mean, are we doing this not to insult hundreds of people or are we doing this for us? Well, for us.
Well, then, why don't we just take a minute and write down the names of all the people that absolutely, positively have to be there, no matter what, to make us happy? One minute.
Yeah.
That's not much time.
What if we forget someone? Then they shouldn't have been invited in the first place.
Let's do it.
Okay.
All right.
- Are we ready? - Yep.
One minute.
And go.
You stopped writing.
So did you.
Of course I'm going to have to invite my mother and Alexis.
- Yeah, and my dad and aunt Theresa.
- Right.
Espo and Ryan, who will bring Jenny.
Mm-hmm.
Lanie.
Lanie.
I'm gonna have to invite the poker group.
- Yeah, Maddie.
- Gates.
Ooh! And Gates' family.