Up on the Roof

[hoosier]

Terry did go to the waterfront park. He didn't have to. He could have waited, paraded into the squad and made a big show of dropping off the coat, probably right smack dab in the middle of Jim's desk, proving to the others that Jim did have it out for him for some unknown reason or as a form of payback.

But he didn't. He went to meet Jim. To play on their friendship one more time, as Maggie suggested? To remind Jim what an upstanding guy and good partner he had been? To get that last word in and maybe to get Jim to change his mind, relent just a little so he could save face? This seems the act of a desperate man--desperate and pathetic--showing up as he did especially after his own parting words. Too bad we never got the chance to see the pre-bank Terry and only have his own words to go by as to what kind of man and what kind of cop he really was.

[maggiethecat]

Great stuff, everyone. mlm88, I have yet to respond to your last long and wonderfully thoughtful post on the previous page . . . but I will when I recover from limerick fever and can think (fairly) straight again.

[hoosier]

With all this talk of the Pilot and UOTR, I realized that Terry didn't use a handerchief when he held the gun so he wouldn't leave fingerprints; he only used the hankie to keep the GSR off his coat. When they processed the gun, they should have found his prints not just Titus Oliver's. How could that be??? He didn't wipe it down or they wouldn't have found Titus'. Everyone who handled the gun did so with gloves or some cloth so as to preserve any evidence. There should have been another set of fingerprints that would have id Terry sooner. Shouldn't there

[maggiethecat]

hoosier said:

With all this talk of the Pilot and UOTR, I realized that Terry didn't use a handerchief when he held the gun so he wouldn't leave fingerprints; he only used the hankie to keep the GSR off his coat. When they processed the gun, they should have found his prints not just Titus Oliver's.

Check me if I'm wrong on this ( ), but wasn't the story always that Titus had dropped the gun in flight after shooting Terry, and Terry had found it on the roof and picked it up . . . which is "why" no one questioned that his prints were on it.

Or maybe that's what I assumed since no one questioned Terry's actions. Is there a line in there somewhere about Titus dropping the gun? Or am I dreaming?

[mlm828]

I can think of three possibilities with regard to fingerprints.

First possibility: According to Terry's original story, the only one who touched Titus's gun was Titus. Since no one except Jim questioned that story, it's possible Titus's gun wasn't processed for fingerprints, at least not right away.

Second possibility: After using the handkerchief to catch the powder burns, Terry used it to wipe his fingerprints from the gun, then planted the gun elsewhere on the roof and hid the handkerchief in the tar bucket.

Third possibility: They did check the gun for fingerprints but weren't able to lift any usable prints.

maggiethecat said:

Check me if I'm wrong on this ( ), but wasn't the story always that Titus had dropped the gun in flight after shooting Terry, and Terry had found it on the roof and picked it up . . . which is "why" no one questioned that his prints were on it.

Or maybe that's what I assumed since no one questioned Terry's actions. Is there a line in there somewhere about Titus dropping the gun? Or am I dreaming?

I think Terry's original story was that Titus dropped his gun while fleeing, before he jumped to the other roof. I don't recall Terry saying he had picked up Titus's gun.

[hoosier]

I just had to force myself to watch this part of UOTR What else could I do today-- has been raining buckets since this morning!

Titus said that the gun dropped from his waistband as he ran up the staircase. Glen told Jim and Karen that they had recovered the gun from the roof . Terry told them that Titus had dropped it when he jumped to the other rooftop after shooting him. Ballistics confirmed it was the weapon that killed the two gangbangers and wounded Terry. Later, Titus told Jim and Karen that he had found the gun on the street and used it to cap Rip and Demetrius but not to shoot the cop.

Its still interesting that they failed to find Terry's fingerprints. He had to have picked it up in the stairwell while chasing Titus and carried it to the roof. If he had wiped it down wouldn't that have smudged Titus' prints as well? And since Titus admitted to finding the gun in the street (probably disposed of after some crime or gang activity) wouldn't they have dusted it to confirm he had held the gun and was most likely the shooter???

[mlm828]

hoosier said:

Its still interesting that they failed to find Terry's fingerprints. He had to have picked it up in the stairwell while chasing Titus and carried it to the roof. If he had wiped it down wouldn't that have smudged Titus' prints as well? And since Titus admitted to finding the gun in the street (probably disposed of after some crime or gang activity) wouldn't they have dusted it to confirm he had held the gun and was most likely the shooter???

In spite of what the "CSI" type shows lead viewers to believe, examining items of physical evidence for fingerprints doesn't happen instantaneously. "Up on the Roof" took place over a period of only two days. It's entirely possible no examination of the gun for fingerprints had occurred by the time DeShaun confessed to the two killings, and Titus was exonerated, and Terry went to Fisk with the "accidental discharge" story. Edited to add: On the other hand, it's also possible the case went to the front of the line at the lab, since it involved the shooting of a cop.

It's also possible that checking the gun for fingerprints would be inconclusive. Prints can be smudged or smeared, or incomplete, or not of good enough quality to allow the fingerprint examiner to make a comparison. This often happens in my cases.

By the way, fingerprint comparison isn't foolproof, either. I was at a seminar earlier this year where one of the speakers debunked the myth of the accuracy of fingerprint comparisons. One of the cases he mentioned was that of the man who was wrongfully accused of being involved in the Madrid train bombings, based on fingerprint evidence. That mistake cost the U.S. government (in other words, us the taxpayers) $2 million:

www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/11/29/mayfield.suit/index.html

[hoosier]

Despite all of today's vaunted technology, there are still problems and inconsistencies! You still have to get down and dirty to solve most cases. Thank goodness that Jim was willing to listen to his gut!

[mlm828]

maggiethecat said:

It starts with a dream . . .



. . . but this time we know it’s a dream. The bleached palette, the slightly drugged tempo, Jim and Christie gazing adoringly into each other’s eyes. Then the shift to nightmare. “We really need you out there, Jimmy.” He goes. Of course he goes – that’s what he does. That’s who he is. Terry Jansen’s there, again, crouched and sweating, and the diner door opens to the silhouette of the shooter and, again, again, the bullet scores across Jim’s temple and he’s jerked from sleep, panicked and disoriented. How many times, and in how many ways, has this scene played out in his dreams?

How many times, indeed? When Jim wakes up, it seems that Christie is the one who's been awakened by his nightmare this morning, and she shakes him awake. Then she asks simply, "Same dream?" That's all she has to ask, because it's always the same dream (or a variation of it, like this morning), and he has it a lot. It's a subtle reminder, I think, of what these two people have been through and are still going through. Then Jim's pager goes off -- the squad. His reaction, as he briefly lies down again, gathering his strength to face the day, reveals the effort he has to put in just to get through his days. It's no accident, in my opinion, that this scene takes place at the beginning of this episode. It's there to remind us that Jim is still struggling with the consequences of what happened that day at the bank.

[hoosier]

How true! And I found it interesting that it was sooo different from the dream at the beginning of the Pilot. In the Pilot, he seemed to be reliving the event at the bank while in UOTR, its almost a blend of reality and fantasy. I feel that the dream in the Pilot was partly stressed induced--he was returning to the job, getting a new partner, worrying about how others would react to him and how he would react in turn, worried if he would be able to make it work etc.

But the dream in UOTR? Things had been going rather smoothly. Yes, he had had a run in with Terry his first day back but that had been several days if not weeks by the time of UOTR. He was proving that he could still do the job even though there were still doubters who wanted him out. He must have felt like he was finally leaving Terry and the past in the past. Why now and why different.

Thanks mlm, for making me think!

[maggiethecat]

I'll be back this weekend when my insane workload eases up, but right now I just want to say thank you, mlm88, for that lovely post -- and thank you, hoosier (you fabulous graduate!) for your thought-provoking response.

Is this perhaps an unexplored Bookend Moment? The dream/nightmare that opens The Pilot, and the dream/nightmare that opens "Up on the Roof?"

Could be . . . and the common thread, the liet motif if you will, is the unresolved issue with Terry and his actions, or lack thereof.

Aaaah, more later . . . and I am so looking forward to it.

[mlm828]

"Bookend moment"? Maybe. It does recall the opening dream/flashback sequence of the Pilot. But when I watched the scene recently -- especially the part after Jim woke up -- it evoked something else for me. Christie's simple question, "Same dream?" and Jim's reply, "Yeah, I guess," tell us this isn't the first time Christie has awakened to find Jim in the throes of a nightmare -- not by a long shot. And it's always the same dream -- or at least, it always ends the same way, with the shooting. It just struck me, during that recent watching, how much that simple question and answer said about what Christie and Jim had been going through. Regardless of how well Jim is now functioning, he is still a person who has been traumatized. Even if Jim isn't willing to admit it, Galloway knows this is the case. And so does Christie. It's been stated elsewhere that it wouldn't have been very Bochco-esque to show flashbacks of the year after the shooting, but this little scene gives us some hints about what it must have been like. And this reminder of what Jim has been through makes Terry's actions in "Up on the Roof" even more reprehensible.

Edited to add: And by showing us the impact of Jim's losing his sight, this first scene makes the episode's final scene -- and the final line -- even more poignant and powerful.

[hoosier]

It makes you wonder what else he has suppressed in order to function at all? Its amazing that he hadn't already exploded into a million pieces with all that bottled hurt and rage at Terry, at fate, and at the entire world in general festering inside. Regardless of what he might have said, that rage was still lurking as witnessed in his session with Galloway when Dr. G. innocently referred to Terry as his "partner" and Jim, who was practically spitting with anger, almost cries that Terry is "not his partner!" That one scene reveals so much about Jim and his feelings towards Terry and what happened at the bank. That is why I don't think he was as done with Terry as he said.

Evidently, Jim's way of coping with what happened to him was to take complete and total control of every aspect of his life. Not to rely or depend on anyone. You can understand how Christie feels confused and frustrated as a result. He shunted off anything negative or counterproductive and his emotions concerning the events at the bank and his ex-partner would fall into that category. Maybe that is one reason why he was having those traumatic dreams--his unconscious mind's way of dealing with the things his conscious mind wouldn't allow him to dwell upon?

[mlm828]

I might have just a little bit of sympathy for Terry, up to the moment where he says, "Don't do this to me, Jimmy." "Don't do this to me"? Jim isn't doing anything to you, Terry, this is about what you did to yourself.

There. I said it.

[maggiethecat]

You called it, mlm. That line always runs through me with an icy chill. "Don't do this to me?" What a self-involved whiner! Don't do what? Don't make me tell the truth, don't make me accept the responsibility of my actions instead of putting it on a black kid who has priors and is therefor "disposable," don't force me off The Job when it's clear that I'm no longer fit for it and haven't been in some time?

If ever a man's character -- or lack thereof -- was writ large in a single line, that would be the one. After all that has transpired . . . Terry still doesn't get it, does he?