Numb3rs Episode 5.03 Blowback

LAPD Detective Jon Schmidt brings the FBI in to help solve an apparent coffee shop robbery in which eight people were executed. Among the deceased is Jerry Lowe, a cop for the LAPD and Ramon Alvarez, a career drug dealer, who we learn is actually working deep cover for the LAPD. After robbery is ruled out as a motive, the main suspect in the homicides is Derek Broxton, who Lowe and Alvarez helped convict for a bank job, and who was just released from prison. Thinking Broxton was out for revenge, the team goes to apprehend him, but Schmidt shoots and kills him claiming he was reaching for his weapon.

Meanwhile, Kurt Young, a big movie producer, contacts Don and tells him that Lowe had been blackmailing him for the past two years. Knowing that the file that’s been being used to blackmail him will turn up now that Lowe is dead, Young asks Don to return it when he comes across it during the investigation. This information, combined with Broxton’s demise at Schmidt’s hand, creates some suspicions at the FBI, which starts to look in to the possibility that Schmidt was involved in the blackmail and murders. They discover that he was the mastermind behind blackmailing Young, and that he tried to get the file from Lowe and Alvarez in order to get a big, final payout from Young. After confronting Lowe and Alvarez, who were unwilling to give up the file, a firefight ensued, and Schmidt killed them both and executed the coffee shop witnesses.

He then killed Broxton to try and frame the murders on him. Ultimately, the file is discovered to be in the possession of a high class prostitute, Lynn, who Lowe had tried to contact just before his murder, and who Lowe had had a relationship with. Colby takes the lead in investigating Lynn, who ends up seducing him. Back at the FBI offices, trying to determine whether or not to give Charlie his security clearance back, Agent McGowan questions Don, Charlie, David, and Colby hoping one of the men will turn on either Don or Charlie.