Tonight on CBS NCIS returns with an all-new Tuesday, February 18, 2019, season 17 episode 16 called, “Ephemera” and we have your weekly NCIS recap below. On tonight’s NCIS season 17 episode 16, “Ephemera,” as per the CBS synopsis, “While investigating the suicide of a retired Navy officer who left a rare, valuable, and possibly stolen coin to the National Museum of the Navy, the team imagines themselves in his life story in order to piece together how the coin ended up in his possession.”
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Retired Navy Master Chief Arturo Amador was found dead at his home. He killed himself. He went to great lengths to make sure everything was perfect and he was even wearing a suit when he was found. Amador didn’t explain why he killed himself, though. It could have been the loneliness because he was listening to an old romance song when he died and he made sure his last moments were staring a picture of an old girlfriend. Amador also could have killed himself because of a coin. He had given a rare dollar coin that was worth seven figures to a friend and this friend confirmed how rare it was. She was going over to ask Amador about it when she learned he was dead.
This friend worked at the Navy Museum. Amador worked there as well. He had retired from the Navy and he took up a position as a volunteer at the museum. He, therefore, knew his coin was worth something. He was surrounded by rare artifacts all day and he should have been able to recognize what he had. Maybe that’s why he gave it to his friend. The team investigated Amador’s death and it was ruled a suicide. There was also something else that Palmer found. Palmer found out Amador was dying from a tumor. He would have lost most of his faculties by the end. And so that could explain why he decided to kill himself.
What the team couldn’t figure out was where the coin came into play. The team investigated Amador’s life and they identified the girl in the picture. Her name was Annie. She and Amador fell in love at first sight and they wanted to get married only her father refused to give his blessing. Annie’s father thought she deserved better than a poor sailor. He came between Annie and Amador and Amador seems to have lashed out against him because of it. Amador’s and Annie’s letters mentioned a coin. A coin that her father owned and that Amador managed to get a hold of. The team was wondering how he got the coin when someone stepped forward with a claim.
Spencer Downing came forward with the claim that the coin belonged to his family. He said Amador stole it from them fifty years ago. Spencer was the brother to Annie and he told them what happened in March of 1972. Amador came over. He tried to get their father’s blessing and not long after he was refused – the coin went missing. Spencer said his father always suspected Amador. The family thought he was a gold digger and they had been happy when his relationship with Annie went nowhere. Annie also died a few months later. She reportedly had thyroid disease and she passed away within weeks of the coin going missing.
Only Spencer didn’t know the full story. His sister continued to see Amador long after their father rejected him and Amador had even given her a ring. There were receipts to back it up. Amador still proposed to Annie and she said yes. Her father threw her ring in the fire when he saw it. He thought that could stop them and it didn’t. Annie and Amador still saw each other. Not that it was perfect. They were seen arguing and the police were called. The police didn’t Amador. They gave him a warning and it was written that he had a coin in his pocket. The team believed that Annie must have found out about the coin and that’s why she argued with her fiancé.
Another thing the team found is that Annie’s death wasn’t from thyroid disease. Palmer looked at her symptoms when she died and she was clearly poisoned. Which makes her death a murder. The best suspect for her murder was her fiancé and thankfully he had an alibi. He was overseas in Vietnam when she died. Her killer must have been someone close to home and so the team investigated it. They later reopened Annie’s coffin. They found evidence of her being poisoned and they also found her wearing her engagement ring. The same ring her father destroyed by throwing into a fire.
The team needed to get a better picture of her relationship with Amador so they read the couple’s love letters. The couple constantly wrote to each other and they used Annie’s Aunt Bertha as an intermediary. Bertha was the only one in Annie’s family that approved of the relationship. She was all set for them getting engaged and she later returned Amador’s letters after Annie died. But who killed Annie? She was consistently poisoned for weeks. It couldn’t have been her boyfriend and so it had to be a family member. The team looked at her brother. Her brother was passed over in the family company and not long after that happened his sister began getting sick.
The team first considered her father because he never approved of Amador, but her father had a change of heart after she got sick and he gave her, her ring back. He had it reset so that she could wear it at the hospital. She must have still been in love with Amador if she wanted to wear and so that ruled him as well. Her killer had to be her brother. They even figured out how he did. They found out that Annie had been given poisonous stamps. She was slowly poisoned each time she wrote to Amador and so the team proved it by tricking the brother into giving up his DNA. And they also heard from Aunt Bertha.
Aunt Bertha is still alive and well. She was the one that explained the coin. She said Annie stole it and that Annie was going to use that to fund a new life for them. She later told Amador what she did and he told her that he was being shipped out. The couple argued about it. Annie didn’t want him risking his life and so that’s the fight the police interrupted. It had nothing to do with the coin. Annie still held onto the coin and so Aunt Bertha ended up giving it to Amador after Annie’s funeral. She wanted him to remember Annie and Amador held onto the coin for sentimental value.
He only gave up on the coin because he knew it could fund a wing at the Navy Museum. Plus, he was already dying and so he didn’t need a coin to remember Annie when he was going to be seeing her soon anyway.
And so the coin got to stay with the Navy Museum.
THE END!
