Public Enemy (Season 5, Episode 15)
Premise: A killer who slashes throats at Providence’s best-loved landmarks lives for the city’s fear, and the BAU stages a public event to draw him out.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 5, Episode 15
- Unsub
- Connor O’Brien (Nate Mooney)
- Location
- Providence, Rhode Island
- Starring
- David Rossi (Joe Mantegna), Aaron “Hotch” Hotchner (Thomas Gibson), Derek Morgan (Shemar Moore), Spencer Reid (Matthew Gray Gubler), Emily Prentiss (Paget Brewster), Jennifer “JJ” Jareau (A.J. Cook), Penelope Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness)
- Opening quote
- “Show me a hero and I will write you a tragedy.” (F. Scott Fitzgerald, read by Rossi)
- Closing quote
- “When a father gives to his son, they both laugh. When a son gives to his father, both cry.” (William Shakespeare, read by Rossi)
- Guest stars
- Sprague Grayden as Meg Collins, Frank John Hughes as Detective Jake Moreland, Larry Clarke as Father Kendellen, Sean Patrick Murphy as Officer Liddy, Timothy Brennen as Billy O’Brien
- Director
- Nelson McCormick
- Writers
- Jess Prenter Prosser
Summary
The Case
“Public Enemy” opens at an early Mass at St. Alvina’s church in Providence, Rhode Island, where Captain Paul Collins, home two weeks from his fourth tour in Iraq, has his throat cut during communion in front of his wife, Meg, and young daughter, Sophia. He is the third victim in two weeks, after Mike O’Donnell in a restaurant restroom and Karen LaGrassa at a laundromat. The killer strikes in plain view, takes whoever is handy and drops his knife each time. Meg and Father Kendellen walk the agents through the Mass, and Sophia reveals she shook the killer’s hand during the sign of peace. Prentiss and Detective Jake Moreland see that every site is a neighborhood landmark, and the team profiles a man who, like an arsonist, feeds on the public’s reaction and comes back to watch it.
JJ keeps the press away from the Collins home while growing close to Meg. A flower seller is then killed at a farmers market, and a witness says the first man to call for help reached him within seconds: the unsub now wants to be part of his scenes. Police seal the market and sort the crowd. Among those held is Connor O’Brien, a diner worker who knows Officer Liddy, and Liddy is later found stabbed in a secluded spot. Meg refuses to front a press event at her church, and the mayor blocks it anyway. Garcia checks employees near police hangouts and finds Connor, whose father, Billy O’Brien, burned his wife to death for the insurance and was jailed after 10-year-old Connor testified; a month ago the father’s life term was cut to allow parole in five years. Connor’s apartment is filled with clippings about his mother and rage at his father, and he kills again, leaving a young mother, Julia Vecchia, dead beside her baby in a library.
The ending
Spoiler: The team has rescuers keep working on Julia and lets the press report that she is clinging to life. Told the victim is a mother, Meg agrees to speak and asks the city to join a candlelight vigil for Julia at St. Frazier’s hospital. Connor turns up to make sure she is dead and is arrested. Because he killed in his father’s jurisdiction, he is likely to land in the same prison, and the final scene finds him there greeting his father before a violent struggle breaks out.
Why it stands out
- Sprague Grayden guest-stars as Meg Collins, the devout wife and mother whose husband is the third victim.
- Nate Mooney plays Connor O’Brien, with Frank John Hughes as Detective Jake Moreland and Larry Clarke as Father Kendellen.