Blue Bloods
Season One, Episode Twenty-One: Cellar Boy
Original Air Date: May 6, 2011
The murder of a couple who lives on the same street as the Reagan's and were family friends cause the Reagan family to take special interest in the case and relive old memories of Joe. Meanwhile, Jamie Reagan faces his own problems when his service revolver turns up missing from his locker and the breaks on his car fail. He finally confides in Danny about Joe's work with the FBI against the Blue Templar.
Frank has a meeting with the Mayor about the budget and cannot sleep. He and Henry talk about Joe, who Frank has been thinking about as it's almost been two years since his death. Frank didn't personally enforce the warrant that Joe was serving when he was killed but he was his Commissioner and he sometimes finds himself left with an inescapable truth: his son was killed on his watch. As his father is telling him he can't think like that, Frank's cell phone rings and the house phone rings. Frank answers his and Henry gets the house phone. Henry's conversation ends first with him telling the caller "alright, I'll tell him". Frank asks his caller when the call came in then to tell his detail he will want to stop there on the way in. When Frank hangs up his father tells him it was Danny who called.
Frank arrives at the scene, his father following him. Frank enters the house while Henry remains outdoors. Kevin Cleary is slumped in an easy chair Danny is bent over the body of a slain woman, Eunice Cleary. Danny stands and tells his father he was on his way into work and had to ask twice when he was given the address. The victims are known to the Reagan's and live just down the street from Frank. Frank tells Danny the Chief of Detectives thought Danny would have the advantage since he's on his "home turf". From looking at the scene, Frank feels Kevin was killed first, then Eunice. The maid found them when she came in to work and called 911 from the Fitzgerald's home. There are no signs of forced entry or robbery and the M.E. puts the crime at sometime the night before. Danny tells his father he doesn't want to be thinking what he is. As they are talking, an officer arrives to inform them the Cleary's daughter has arrived. Outside, their daughter, Anne Cleary (Gretchen Egolf) runs toward the house but Henry stops her saying no one can go inside. She sees Frank and Danny leaving the house and asks them what is going on. Frank tells her he is sorry as her brother, Al (Sean Patrick Reilly) runs up to her. He wants to go in but Frank tells him he can't as it's a crime scene. Danny tells them their parents were attacked last night and found this morning and that is all they can say. Anne asks what happened but Danny again says they can't say. Al begs him to tell them and Henry tells him Danny would say that to anyone as it is an ongoing investigation. Al asks where their brother Ronnie (Nathaniel Marston) is and Frank tells them he isn't there.
Al tells Danny he knew something would happen ever since his parents allowed Ronnie to move back in but Annie warns him not to jump to conclusions. Danny informs them Ronnie didn't show up for work and asks if they know where he might have gone. Al tells him what friends Ronnie hasn't stolen from he cut off years ago. Anne says the only person who stood by Ronnie was his sponsor from meetings he attended at the Methodist church on Grove. Danny asks when the last time each of them saw or spoke with their parents. Anne stopped in to see her parents the day before on her way home from work. Danny asks Al where he was last night and, when Al is insulted by the question, Danny tells him he has to ask. Al tells him he was home. His wife and kids are in Florida as her father is sick and they are with him. Anne was home as well and her doorman can verify that. Al asks when they get to see their parents and Danny tells them one of them will have to identify the bodies at the morgue.
At the precinct, Danny and Jackie discuss the case. The K-9 unit is out looking for the murder weapon and there is a slot in the kitchen rack consistent with the knife used to kill the Cleary's. There are also distinct footprints in the blood made by one person. Erin arrives and asks Danny if he really thinks Ronnie killed his parents. Danny says he's definitely a person of interest along with anyone who had known access to the house. A neighbor puts Ronnie at the house as she saw him while she was walking her dog. Erin remarks there's been trouble there but this leading Jackie to ask about the trouble. Danny tells her Mr. Cleary rode the kids something terrible, mostly the boys and mostly Ronnie. Al ended up working at the car dealership with his father. Erin says that Al was always more resilient but Ronnie was sensitive. Danny adds that Mr. Cleary called Ronnie "cellar boy" and thought it was funny, something that made Ronnie cringe. Ronnie moved down to the basement when he was 14. Danny didn't know which came first: Ronnie moving to the basement or moving to the basement to drink and smoke pot. Jackie asks where the mother was in all this and Erin says "rose colored glasses, I guess". Danny says they had knock-down drag-outs at the Cleary home and just last year, a unit responded to a 52 with Ronnie and Mr. Cleary going at it again. Jackie asks about a 35-year-old living at home and Erin supplies the information that he was bi-polar, using and he would move out, switch states, switch jobs, get in trouble, move back in, get cleaned up. She asks if Danny knows where he is but he doesn't. They have a message out on his car and his AA sponsor said if he hears from him he will let them know. When Erin comments 'poor Ronnie' Danny hands her the file to look at the photos of the Cleary's at the crime scene.
As Jamie is arriving early for work, he is met by Sonny Malevsky (Michael T. Weiss). He comments that Jamie is now driving his brother Joe's car. Jamie asks Malevsky there and when questioned why he wants to know Jamie tells him no reason. Malevsky tells Jamie to be safe then walks away. Inside, Renzulli is getting ready for work when Jamie enters the locker room. They talk about how they spent their day off and Jamie tells him he worked on his car on his. Jamie reaches onto the top shelf of his locker for his service revolver and finds it missing. He asks Renzulli about it who asks if he's sure he didn't take it home but Jamie is sure he didn't as he swaps it out with his off duty weapon. Renzulli thinks it might be a prank one of the other guys is pulling on him and asks if he made anyone angry, which he didn't. Renzulli tells Jamie to take everything out of the locker and go through it then go back home and go over every square inch of his place for the gun before reporting it to the C.O. because then it becomes official and he's back under I.A. investigation. Jamie asks if Malevsky was back there and Renzulli says he wasn't. He was at the front desk talking with the guys when he came in and asks Jamie why. When Jamie comments how easy the locks are to bypass Renzulli asks if he thinks Malevsky stole his gun and Jamie brushes his comment aside.
At One NYPD Plaza, Frank is in his office and Baker (Abigail Hawk) enters with the Mayor (Bruce Altman). He comes into the office immediately telling Frank he asked him to cut 10% from the budget and missed by a mile. Frank tells him he did everything he could without crippling the department. The Mayor counters that his department is frozen and they will postpone the June Academy class. Frank warns if they don't bring the cops online they will be reduced to 1992 levels but the Mayor insists there is no money and he will not raise taxes because of him. Frank maintains he will not police the city with those kinds of reductions and no one, including the Mayor, will want the kind of pain it brings. When the Mayor asks if that was a threat Frank replies the threat is to the citizens and the $30 billion tourist industry they all depend upon. The Mayor, still unhappy with how Frank handled the tourist shooting tells him to stick to what he knows and Frank replies that what he knows is the force cannot be cut any further. The Mayor warns that he is going to the City Council with the budget, including all the others who worked with him, and with Frank standing beside him. If he tries to make him look bad he will be bringing a knife to a gun fight and leaves the office.
Jackie points out motive for Ronnie including a giant insurance policy and the house but Danny doesn't see Ronnie as the only one since all three of the Cleary kids stand to inherit. Anne's doorman confirmed her alibi but he says that doesn't mean she couldn't have left later so they will check for video footage. Al was home alone so they need to try and find someone to back that story up. Jackie notes that the car dealership was failing and two salesmen were let go in the past couple of months. Danny feels they should speak with them. Jackie thinks that with Mr. Cleary pouring all of his personal money into the business taking out of the inheritance Al cannot be too pleased about that. Danny brings up that the neighbor told him Mr. Cleary had booked an around the world cruise for he and his wife for their anniversary. The cost was close to $100,000. She looks through the files and sees that, while he might have booked it, he hadn't started paying on it. Both Jackie and Danny's phones ring. When they have both hung up, Danny tells Jackie Ronnie's AA sponsor called to say Ronnie called him from the Restwell Motel and sounds suicidal. Jackie's call was that patrol spotted Ronnie's car in the Restwell parking lot.
At the motel, an incredibly agitated Ronnie is holding an axe and fire extinguisher and telling the police to go ahead and shoot him. He throws the extinguisher at them and continues to yell at them. When Danny and Jackie arrive, he takes over since he knows Ronnie and feels he can get close to him. Danny calls up to Ronnie and the latter tells Danny to get out of there. He doesn't want to talk to Danny. Danny starts walking up the stairs toward Ronnie who is becoming more agitated by the second. When Ronnie starts to run toward Danny with the axe raised, the police raise their guns but Danny orders them not to fire. Danny gets within steps of Ronnie and asks him to talk like they did when they were kids but Ronnie isn't unwilling. Ronnie keeps saying "please just let them kill me, please" and tells Danny he's ruining everything. Danny manages to overcome Ronnie and he is taken into custody.
At the precinct, Jackie and Danny bring Ronnie into the interview room. Ronnie tells Danny he got up that morning to go to work. When he went upstairs to get some breakfast he saw his parents had been murdered. Danny asks why he didn't call 911 since he didn't kill his parents and Ronnie tells him he didn't want to go to jail. Danny asks if he and his father got into an argument again because his father found out he was using again. When Ronnie says 'no', Danny tells him he knows he's lying because they found the weed, prescription bottle and half empty bottle of vodka under his bed. Ronnie insists he isn't using heroin and Danny asks if he got high and slept right through his parent's murder. As Danny pushes harder Ronnie wants him to stop talking but Danny insists he won't stop until he finds out who killed the Cleary's. Danny asks who did it if it wasn't Ronnie. Ronnie doesn't know but he reminds Danny that outside the house his father was Mr. Popularity. Inside the house, he was a monster. Jackie comes to the door to tell Danny she needs to talk to him. She has a pair of shoes that K-9 picked up the scent on. They were found in a trash can in the corner of the park. Danny takes the shoes back in to Ronnie to tell him the blood will be matched to his mother and the tread will match the prints found at the scene. Ronnie begins crying as Danny tells Jackie to take him to Central Booking.
Renzulli and Jamie get a cup of coffee and Renzulli says they need to talk. He can tell when someone is trying to B.S. him. First, he caught Jamie looking into the Gonsalves file and now there is the Sonny Malevsky thing. How can he ride with him if he can't trust him and it works both ways. Jamie asks Renzulli if he's ever heard of the Blue Templar. When Renzulli says not in a thousand years Jamie asks what he knows about them. Renzulli says the world changed and they have a more professional police force now and there are no more cowboy posses and wants to know why but Jamie says he can't tell him. Renzulli asks if he can't or won't. Jamie points out they must trust each other and asks him to trust him on this one.
Garrett Moore brings Frank his speech for the Knights of Columbus dinner and Frank tells him the Mayor is insisting he publicly endorses the budget cuts. Frank has a problem. He can run the department with 1,000 fewer people and he can't prove that unless the crime rate goes up at which time it will be too late. He asks Garrett how they can get out in front of it and Garrett suggests the power of the press--headline "Mayor to NYPD: Drop Dead". Garrett asks Frank if he understands what he's proposing and Frank simply says he isn't proposing anything as he can't even remember the conversation and Garrett leaves to put the plan into action.
When Danny and Jackie take Ronnie into booking, Erin is there wanting to speak with him. She asks what happened as the more they know they more they can help him but he refuses to tell the assistant D.A. anything. She tells him she got him the best legal aid attorney there is and begs him to cooperate with them. Danny and Jackie take him into booking.
Erin meets Frank for dinner and he tells her he got beat up pretty good at his meeting. No one has won yet as they are in the middle rounds. She tells him about seeing Ronnie at Central Booking and how he got her thinking about Joe. They talk about old times when the kids were growing up. She asks her father if he thinks they'll ever stop missing Joe but he doesn't answer.
That night, Jamie meets with Yolanda Gonsalves (Andrea Navedo). He comments he knew that Lydia had a twin and they truly do exactly alike and asks how Lydia's daughter is. She tells him they are adjusting and the reason she wanted to see him is Lydia left a package for her with her things. There were insurance issues with the suicide and the estate only recently became available to her. She said if anything happened to her, she should give him this and pulls an envelope from her pocket. He tells her he doesn't think Lydia's death was a suicide, something Yolanda agrees with. Jamie promises he will make it right and she hopes what is in the envelope will help.
Danny arrives at Frank's house with ribs for Sunday dinner. Frank comments things look bad for Ronnie Cleary and Danny admits everyone's alibi's check out, even the sometimes boyfriend of Anne Cleary. Danny tells him they have enough to make an arrest but Erin says they probably don't have enough to get a jury to convict without the murder weapon. Danny comments that the sneakers were found in the opposite direction of the motel where Ronnie was found and it seems like they should have found the knife where the sneakers were found. Mrs. Cleary put up a struggle but she has no genetic material under her nails except for latex meaning the killer used gloves and could explain why Ronnie had no scratches on his hands from the struggle. That would point to the fact he planned the killings instead of it being an alcoholic rage. That bothers Danny because he feels it would be the first time in Ronnie's life he planned anything.
Danny pays a visit to Al Cleary at the dealership and tells him the thought out murders doesn't seem like Ronnie. Al tells him the heroin addict their family has had to deal with is a master of manipulation and lies. He played his parents. Danny finds it to be a well thought out answer. Al tells Danny that, at least now, Ronnie will get the help he needs and will stay on his meds. Danny says he keeps thinking about him, Al, being a 42-year-old man working under his father day after day. It can't be easy. Al comments Danny should know as he isn't the only one taking orders from his old man.
Jamie goes to see Lt. Alex Bello (Nick Sandow) of Internal Affairs. Bello tells Jamie the business of the missing gun needs immediate attention and Jamie informs him the gun was taken from his locker. Bello suggests Jamie sold it, something he denies and says again that someone stole it. Bello points out that a new officer makes $45,000 a year and Jamie has $85,000 worth of student loan debt. Jamie asks for proof the weapon was sold or if Bello is just making an accusation. Bello points out that whether the gun is lost or sold it could wind up in the wrong hands and show up in a crime which could be a real problem for Jamie. Bello warns if Jamie doesn't find the gun they will launch a full-blown investigation and they will be keeping a close eye on him in the meantime then sends him from the office. When he's gone, Bello calls Malevsky who asks what Bello thought. Bello feels Jamie is a liability. Malevsky calmly says "ok" and hangs up.
At Sunday dinner the subject of the budget comes up but Frank doesn't want that discussed. Erin brings up the subject of the Cleary's. She saw Anne there and it looked like she was packing up everything. Henry comments it had been an unhappy house for a while. Jack asks if they are talking about 'cellar boy's' house and Danny calls his son down. Both Frank and Danny point out that a father shouldn't call his son names. Henry brings up that now it's the parents fault what happened. Erin says Ronnie will end up in an appropriate facility but Henry remarks that Ronnie was able to run which, in his book, is an admission of guilt and sanity, something Danny agrees with. Frank says a big part of the problem was that Mr. Cleary couldn't accept that his son was ill.
After dinner, Frank walks Jamie out to his car and asks if he's alright. He asks Jamie if he's sorry about the choice he made to put on the uniform. Erin interrupts them commenting that their mother's tulips are looking great. Jamie takes the opportunity to excuse himself saying he has a reunion he must attend. Erin tells Frank she and Danny are making a condolence call to Anne Cleary and Danny points out it is a 'slash re-interview' and asks Frank if he wants to come, something he declines.
Erin and Danny go inside and see that she is, indeed, packing up the house. Anne tells Erin what she said to Al really upset him. Danny asks if it is a crazy thought that Ronnie didn't kill their parents. She asks him if her family was the subject of conversation at the famous Reagan Sunday dinner and comments that Ronnie used to rub it in to her folks why their family couldn't be more like the Reagan's. When Erin says that isn't fair, Anne comments that she should understand as her divorce can't be easy and her misery is the fodder for other peoples conversations. She excuses herself saying she has work to do and Danny stops her to apologize. He tells her the good news is they found the knife and are expecting lab results back tomorrow. They won't find much as they are sure the killer wore gloves and maybe they will get lucky. She says 'poor Ronnie' and walks away. Erin asks her brother if they found the murder weapon and he tells her they didn't but he's shaking the tree to see if anything falls out. She asks if that's why he subpoenaed all of Anne and Al's phone calls. He says if he's right, she's calling Al right now.
That night, when Jamie tries to stop at a yellow light he finds the breaks in his car do not work. He narrowly avoids a collision at the intersection and continues into traffic having a hard time controlling the car. He barely avoids hitting two pedestrians and finds himself on a deserted street. He ends up crashing the car into a barrier just feet from the water.
Jackie and Danny are staking out the Cleary dealership. Sure enough, Anne called Al as soon as Danny and Erin left the house. It isn't long before Anne shows up to meet with her brother. She drags him outside the dealership and the two are clearly arguing. Al and Anne run to an area next to the dealership and move a rock. Beneath it, is the murder weapon wrapped in a bloody cloth. As Al is wiping blood and prints off the knife, Danny and Jackie drive up. Danny orders Al to drop the knife as Al calls his sister an "idiot".
The next morning, Baker is giving Frank his daily schedule when the Mayor arrives, angry and carrying a newspaper. He reads a bit from the article and throws it down. Frank asks if the Mayor thinks he had something to do with that, which he does, something Frank denies. The Mayor informs him if he can't deliver a balanced budget the state will take over and asks if he has any idea what the hillbillies upstate will do to his beloved department if they get control of the finances. Frank asks the Mayor what he will do and the reply is that he will find the money somewhere but he forewarns Frank that he and his plausible deniability will not fly anymore. Garrett enters the office asking if the Mayor is cranky and Frank comments he was sensitive about an article in the morning paper. Garrett looks at the paper as Baker leaves the office. Frank gives him the Columbus speech back for further polishing.
Ronnie Cleary stops by Erin's office to see her. She welcomes him with a hug telling him she's sad about his parents but glad he isn't taking the fall for it. She tells him Anne confessed to the whole thing. It was Al's idea as the money their parents were going to spend on the trip was a tipping point for him. Ronnie keeps thinking about that night and it's a blank. Anne laced his grapefruit juice with sleeping pills and Al wore his shoes through their parents blood. They were going to plant the knife and shirt soaked in blood near his motel to seal his fate. She asks him what he's going to do now and he says "stay clean" with a smile. He tells her he can't live in the house anymore and asks what she thinks he should do and adds that he's single. He thinks he'll go down to Florida as he has a kid there somewhere. She asks him to stay in touch.
Jamie is outside Frank's house waiting for Danny. When he arrives, Jamie tells them there is something he should hear and plays the recording Joe made about the Templar. Jamie tells him the recording was made the night Joe was killed and he was working with the FBI investigating the group. Danny asks if their father knows and Jamie assures him he doesn't.
Blue Bloods airs on Friday nights at 10:00 p.m. (Eastern time) on CBS.
For more information:
Blue Bloods Official Site: http://www.cbs.com/primetime/blue_bloods/
The Internet Movie Database: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1595859/
TV Rage: http://www.tvrage.com/Blue_Bloods
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