Tonight on CBS NCIS returns with an all-new Monday, April 14, 2025, season 22 episode 17 called, “Killer Instinct,” and we have your weekly NCIS recap below.
In tonight’s NCIS season 22 episode 17 called “Killer Instinct,” as per the CBS synopsis, “After NCIS captures the hitman known as “The Poet,” the team races to uncover who ordered the assassination of a Navy chief.”
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NCIS arrested Paul Morton for murder tonight. They got a tip he killed of Naval Lt. Commander Ryan Willis. He was picked up with his gun on him and it was a match for the weapon used to kill the commander. He really was their killer, but it gets worse than that. He also had a book on him. It was a match for poems left on several murder victims and so Morton was revealed to be the serial killer known as “the Poet”. The Director was very happy with NCIS. What they couldn’t figure out was why Morton didn’t leave a poem on Willis.
They were also curious about who called in the tip. They tried interrogating Morton. They were hoping he’d give them some much needed answers. He instead spouted off a poem. He even showed them his bruised arms before he passed out in the interrogation room. There was a chance he might have taken something or done something to himself when he saw the feds were about to pick him up. He wasn’t just a serial killer. He was a hitman. He has evidence against a lot of people and he could have sold those people out to NCIS.
It wouldn’t have gotten him a lighter sentence although it would have kept him off death row. Not that death seemed to matter to Morton. He killed himself in that stunt he pulled in the interrogation room. He dug into his own arms and activated capsules he had hidden under his skin. He was a professional to the end. He was dead and NCIS had to get their own answers. They eventually found that the Poet didn’t just target Willis. He also targeted another man that was working with Willis on the Atlas.
The Department of Energy has a train carrying nuclear fuel throughout the whole country. The Navy provided security for that train. It was all hush hush. The sailors providing security had their files listed as them serving on the Atlas. Only there was no navy ship known as the Atlas. The team quickly picked up on that and they found out the truth. They found out about the train. They were worried about a breach. They were going to head there when Deputy Director LaRoche stopped them.
LaRoche said that the Department of Energy would handle that. NCIS were told to investigate the murders and nothing else. It was an order from their boss. They had to follow it even as they had doubts about why LaRoche was getting involved with this one. LaRoche wasn’t all he seemed. He had secrets. McGee wanted to learn those secrets and so he was investigating LaRoche. He was doing that on the side. His wife knew about it. She also thought it was jealousy driving him and not suspicion.
Delilah met LaRoche tonight. They easily hit it off. She thought her husband was suspicious of LaRoche because LaRoche beat him when he became Deputy Director. McGee interviewed for the position. He was investigated. He had congressional hearings. Then he finds out he didn’t get the job. The department wanted to go with someone from the outside and so McGee was overlooked. He had the experience with leadership. He was already working for the Navy. He thought he was a sure thing until Director Vance told him that the committee went with LaRoche.
Now McGee being suspicious of the man was considered jealousy when it really was experience. There was a situation that got bad for Torres. He was almost killed and McGee suspected LaRoche played a part in burning him. He also suspected the man was wiretapping his family’s phones. LaRoche made jokes about mints that McGee loved. McGee never told him about that and neither did his wife. Yet, somehow LaRoche knew enough to make a joke. He hid a lot in his little jokes. It all came out at the dinner at LaRoche’s house that Delilah dragged him into.
LaRoche’s wife was a neurosurgeon. He said she could heal paraplegics until they could tap dance. McGee was a tapper and again neither he nor his wife ever mentioned so to LaRoche. McGee was experiencing the night from hell when NCIS got a lead. They found Morton’s broker. The middleman between him and the clients. Her name is Gemma Wood. She was a jeweler with her own store. She’s never seen Morton in person. She also didn’t know he was dead and so Torres pretended to be Morton.
He went to her store with a story about someone burning him. She must have been worried because she ran. They found her dead guard and her secret second safe. Gemma later said that the client turned against her. If you fail in this type of job, the client hires a second person to go kill the first person. They needed Gemma to get to Morton. She realized that and she tried to run. Her client was Carla Morino. The mob boss from Kansas that Parker tried to take down. He tried for several years and nothing ever worked.
It was odd that Morino wanted access to the nuclear fuel. She dabbled in weapons and drugs. She’s never gone full terrorist. She’s also never tried to kill someone in government. The poet’s next target was LaRoche. LaRoche sat on the board of directors that had control over the Atlas train. It was so top secret that he claimed he wasn’t allowed to tell Director Vance about it. McGee and LaRoche had it out when LaRoche found McGee snooping through his office. LaRoche was investigating McGee.
McGee found evidence of it. LaRoche said he did that because McGee investigated him first. He knew that McGee was looking through his past and checking his security access. When McGee confronted LaRoche with his suspicions, LaRoche called him a sore loser. He said McGee was just hurt he got the job and McGee didn’t. The fight was so bad between the men that LaRoche didn’t want to leave with McGee when he heard about the security threat. He wanted to wait for backup. Parker told him that McGee could have already killed him if that was the case.
McGee was armed. LaRoche had a gun safe. He just couldn’t remember the code to it. His wife also wasn’t of any help. The hitman arrived just in time to take out the cops. LaRoche wanted to sacrifice himself to save the others. McGee talked him out of it. They came up with a plan. McGee pretended to be Morton and shot LaRoche. He kept the new hitman busy until his friends showed up. LaRoche was wearing a bulletproof vest and so he was fine. And Gemma eventually admitted that Carla Morino was not her client.
Her client was the Nexus Cartel. NCIS took them down last year. They were apparently back and they were making moves. The Atlas train has been temporarily stopped. LaRoche was saved, but McGee found out he was right to suspect LaRoche. The tip that led them to the poet came from the Department of Defense. It came from LaRoche.
How did he know a serial killer was coming after him?
THE END
