12E04 - Keeper

The BAU heads to the Appalachian Trail less than one hundred miles away from Quantico as State Trooper Jim Carson, investigating a shoplifting case by a homeless man, found the man's camp just off the trail - but no man - his camp which included a bag of body parts. After separating the body parts, the medical examiner determines that they belong to four middle aged Caucasian men and one twenty-something Caucasian woman. The bodies were crudely hacked apart, the victims killed anywhere from approximately one year ago to a few weeks ago, the woman the latest victim. The store where the shoplifting occurred has surveillance footage of the homeless man, who, according to one account, looks like he would not have the cognitive ability to tie his shoes. All he stole was dog food and nothing for himself to eat, leading to the team believing that his food source is his victims, and that the killings are not targeted but rather incidents of opportunity. When the team is able to identify the female victim, they change their victimology, now believing the woman was the anomaly as a witness to something perpetrated by the homeless man, who truly is targeting white, middle aged men. The team is eventually able to apprehend the homeless man, but with another potential victim having gone missing in the meantime. The homeless man, who indeed seems to be suffering some some mental issues, calls himself Todd, and seems to be fixated on finding his dog, Cormac, the reason for the stolen dog food. The team will have to work their way through Todd's seeming emotional issues, including the role of Cormac in the killings, if they have any hope of finding the missing man, unless there is another piece to the puzzle. Through the investigation, Reid goes through his own roller coaster of emotions in issues dealing with his mother.