While giving his testimony in a retrial, Grissom sees fingerprints on a matchbox that he does not recall. The victim Max Larson was found dead I his hardware store hit by a wrench. He requests a recess to the DA and reopens the investigation of the case. He follows the protocol and assigns Catherine, Warrick and Nick to investigate the case again and why they have missed the fingerprint in their investigation. Ecklie asks Sofia to investigate Grissom's cases and begins a witch hunt in the laboratory. Meanwhile, Sara, Greg and Det. Louis Vartann investigate the case of a John Doe, who died after shooting his own leg. When they succeed to find the register of the gun, they find clue of another case.

When the flight attendant Martha Krell is found dead and raped in her hotel room, Grissom, Greg, Sara and Capt. Brass investigate the case. They note that there is no luggage in the room that was cleaned and sanitized without any evidence. Ecklie tells Sara that he had a similar case five years ago, with the flight attendant Sue Stein. Sara notes that the present technology is able to retrieve the fingerprint from the previous case. Meanwhile, Catherine, Nick, Warrick and Det. Chris Cavaliere investigate the case of the death of the twelve-year-old Ty Hawkins, who has been beaten to death on his bed while sleeping. His fourteen-year-old brother Matt becomes the prime suspect to Det. Cavaliere and when Matt confesses the murder of his brother, Nick questions the way Det. Cavaliere conducted the interrogation. The CSI team proceeds the investigation and finds two other suspects: Ty's father Martin and the homeless Walter. Who might be the murderer?

When the university students Paula Levine and Trip Wilmont are found dead on the floor after having sex in Trip's dormitory room, Grissom, Sara, Greg and Capt. Brass investigate the case. Grissom leaves the case since he has to go to the court and Sara and Greg use the monoxide carbon detector to look for a source, but they do not find any monoxide carbon in the room. Meanwhile, Brass talks to his next-door neighbor Zack Capola, who says that Trip and him were just mates, not friend. Sara and Greg proceed the investigation. Meanwhile, Catherine, Warrick and Nick join to David Phillip in the middle of a crop circle to investigate the death of a man. In the autopsy, they learn that the victim has urinated in his underwear. When the CSI team locates the owner of the helicopter that was in that area, they learn what has happened to Kevin Staniland. Meanwhile, Det. Louis Vartann finds that no investigator is available and Conrad Ecklie is forced to go with him to the Tangiers since there is a dead body needing to be processed. They learn that the victim is James Billmeyer from New Jersey and Ecklie requests the shoes of the woman that found the body since she stepped on the blood. When James' body vanishes from the morgue there is a further investigation.