Original subtitles

[Catch Me A Killer Theme]

[pensive music]

What time is it?

A little after nine.

Thank you.

[Mark] You crashed out soon after you arrived.

Obviously needed it.

Sorry.

Do you wanna tell me what happened?

Just needed to get away.

There's something I wanna show you.

[tense music]

[Officer] Are you clear to see the body?

All right, no, that should be fine.

Hopefully we've got what we need.

Let's get her to the dock.

We can always come back.

Doc's gonna move the body soon,

but he agrees, one or two days maximum.

Did you tell Micki?

Yeah, she's in Wemmer Pan,

but I'll keep her updated.

She'll be in contact.

Any thoughts?

Well, she's a much shorter distance from the road

and we're dangerously close to the previous bodies,

so I think he's losing control of his urges.

Some people call this the frenzy stage.

He's getting reckless.

[Officer] Pieter, check here.

[tense music]

Is that what I think it is?

Yeah.

Great, bag and tag it.

Hopefully we get lucky.

[Officer] Forensics.

[shouting]

[tense music]

I lived out here for a while after I graduated,

training to be a lawyer.

I was engaged.

Saskia was her name.

Oh, what happened?

One day she stepped out of the shower

and her legs gave out.

Brain tumour.

Six weeks later she was gone, just like that.

- That's horrible. - Yeah.

For a while I just shut down and came up here,

but it did teach me something.

At the end of the day,

you have to take control of your own recovery.

And then I found this.

[serene music]

Wow.

I'd swim down there at least once a week.

Read somewhere that the minerals in the water

had healing qualities.

- Wanna go? - No!

- Yes? - No!

Yes.

How cold is it?

It's refreshing.

Okay.

Okay, let's do it.

All right, come on.

[pensive music]

[serene music]

Sorry, Suzaan.

I just, um...

I thought she was visiting family.

I hoped it was you.

I'm probably mistaken.

No, I'm sure she's checked in with one of my colleagues.

Please don't worry, I'm always the last to hear.

Just forget I called.

Um...

I'll give her a slap from you when I see her, okay?

[Louis] I mean, we could send it to the lab for analysis.

No, no, no, the lab already has the condom,

they say it has been soiled.

Sorry, does that mean they can use it to identify?

Yeah, they're pretty confident they can extract DNA,

so yeah, looks like we're getting somewhere.

What did Micki say?

You spoke to her?

Uh, yes.

She, um, wanted to ensure

that we're going through old rape cases.

We're pretty sure that the killing aspect of his MO

was a later development.

Well, I've got Louis on that,

but if you feel it's a priority...

It is, we think.

Um...

I can help.

Sure, be my guest.

All right.

[tense music]

[Mark] Here you go.

Mm.

- Can I ask you a question? - Mm.

Do you think you'll always do what you do?

- What, making wine? - Mm-hm.

Um...

I mean, I started because I thought it was natural.

Grows, ages, ferments really by itself

and I like that,

so yeah, probably.

What about you?

When I was a kid

my dad showed me this old news reel from the 1930s.

It was black and white, no sound.

It was of USS Akron,

this big American airship, a zeppelin.

The airship's trying to moor

and it's being guided by these Navy sailors

all holding it down by the guy ropes,

and then suddenly the wind changes.

The airship goes up.

Now, all the men instinctively let go, apart from four.

They held on and up they go.

Now, one guy, he's smart,

he lets go at about 15 or 20 feet up

and he falls and just breaks his arm,

but the others don't.

Soon it's too late,

too high.

One by one you watch them fall.

Just tiny little figures,

kicking and screaming

and waving their arms all the way down.

The only guy who made it is the one who held on.

Eventually they hauled him up onto the airship.

And what, that's you holding on?

Deon showed you this as a child?

Jesus.

[both laughing]

Have you told anyone else that?

No.

[laughing]

All right, well, what do you think it means?

You want me to analyse myself for your benefit?

- Absolutely. - Mm, okay.

I wanna know how you see yourself.

Well, I suppose I would say I am a dichotomy.

[Mark] Okay.

Part of me is messy and chaotic.

[Mark] Uh-huh.

- Passionate. - Uh-huh.

It wants to throw caution to the wind,

to just believe in the dream.

But then I also really need control, yeah.

It's like I'm too scared

or too guarded to just let go.

I mean, you did today.

[tense music]

[tense music builds]

[pensive music]

[pensive music continues]

Okay, so if I'm gonna make potjie tonight,

then I should run into town and get some groceries.

Micki.

Yeah.

Yeah, sounds good.

I was profiling a man who targets young black women.

He binds them, gags and bludgeons them and rapes them

before he chokes them to death.

So far there are 19 bodies.

19 girls left to rot face down in sugarcane fields,

and my job requires that I...

I immerse myself in that guy's mind.

I feel his urges, his desire.

I look at what he's done

and I have to imagine committing those crimes.

I invite him inside me.

If I don't give myself over to it completely,

it doesn't fucking work.

Sometimes I think I even experience the same mood as him.

How fucked up is that?

Like, if he's anxious that the police are close,

it's...

It's like I feel it too,

so now I second guess everything.

If I'm feeling good, I wonder what the hell he's up to.

And the trouble is, um...

I have felt good.

That's allowed.

Yeah.

[chuckling nervously]

[pensive music]

Thirsty?

Grab us a drink.

Sure.

[tense music]

[phone ringing]

Hello?

[Micki] Erika.

Micki, thank God.

Where the hell are you?

Uh, Grabouw.

Grabouw?

Are you okay?

Yeah, I just needed to take some time.

Listen, I had this feeling that I should call.

You think?

I've left you about 100 voicemails.

Sorry, my, um...

My phone died.

Did something happen?

We have another body, we found her yesterday.

This time she'd only been there a day or two.

We lifted a condom from the scene, so we have the guy's DNA.

Pieter has the lab crosschecking it

with a blood test from an old rape case.

[Micki] Which old case?

Oh, Louis dug it up, it never made it to court.

But get this, the victim claimed the suspect

dragged her off the street and tried to tie her up.

The only reason she got away

was because somebody heard her cry out.

Micki?

Micki, Pieter is breathing down my neck.

He's saying if they go to a magistrate with this guy,

he wants you there to certify he fits the profile.

Micki, please can you come back today?

[sombre music]

Are you going back?

They said they'd need me.

What about you?

[sombre music continues]

Look, I'm not...

I know you're under a lot of pressure, but there is a cost.

[tense music]

[tense music continues]

Dr. Pistorius, welcome back.

What's that smell?

Are you cooking something?

We are getting rid of the flesh from the skulls.

Yeah, it is how it's done,

it's the only way,

so that it can be flown to Pretoria.

[tense music]

Sorry.

[Micki vomits]

Micki, good, you're back.

How was Wemmer Pan?

Erika said you had another case to visit.

Oh, uh, right, yeah.

Well, no, we made a start at least.

Okay, good, good.

We finally have an arrest warrant.

Got a DNA match.

[tense music]

Right, ready to ride.

Sipho Mandler Agmatir Thwala.

Okay, so, 29, local, and he's got previous.

Yeah, he grew up working in the sugar fields.

Born and raised in Besters

and he lives there now, with his mum.

It's like this guy fell directly from the pages

of your bloody profile.

I'm sorry, what's Besters?

Squatter camp.

Okay, and where's that?

Right here.

KwaMashu, just south of the highway.

It's a short distance from Mount Edgecombe.

So there are no house numbers in Besters,

so we've relied heavily on informers.

It's this one here, right?

Yeah, you can't really tell from these,

but that's actually an alleyway,

and this here is a stream running alongside it.

His place, right between the two.

Yeah, they say it's identifiable by a red colour door.

[Pieter] Yeah, we can bring in the cars

up to about here and there.

[Arno] After that, small specialised units here.

An armed unit?

Yeah, the locals don't care for us, hey?

Won't that panic them?

Let's be smart about this.

It's dark in about three hours.

We go when it's quiet, fewer people on the streets.

Small teams, less panic.

I want you two in the mix, okay?

Every officer armed, no exceptions.

[tense music]

[knocking]

Ah, Micki.

I just wanted to say, um...

I'm really sorry for running off like that.

For what it's worth,

I don't think I had much choice.

I, uh...

lost a young detective this case.

Sebastian.

I know.

Esther told me.

[Pieter sighing]

I was mentoring him.

A smart kid.

Sensitive.

His wife found him in the bath.

Sleeping pills.

He just...

Just couldn't deal with it anymore, you know?

Young girls were dying a horrible, violent death

because he couldn't find this guy.

Anyway, this was in his desk drawer,

so I thought I'd fill it,

and, you know, later we can...

Bloody scared as hell he gets away, Micki.

He won't.

[tense music]

All right, everybody come closer, listen up.

Two teams.

As we said,

the first led by myself and Superintendent de Beer.

We'll divide into Alpha and Bravo.

We'll approach separately, converge on the property,

detain and arrest.

Second team, Micki and Erika, wait for our signal,

then approach and help secure the property and the evidence.

I want this done smoothly and tightly.

No fuck ups, right?

Okay then, let's get this guy.

Let's go, let's go, let's go.

[tense music]

Hey, will you be all right?

Guess I'll find out.

[tense music]

[tense music continues]

[whispering] Come, come, come, come.

Bravo team, let's go.

Let's get this guy.

[tense music]

We're going in.

Anything changes, let us know.

Radio channel four.

[tense music]

Bravo team following the stream, over.

Okay, back there, back there, go, go, go.

[tense music]

Bravo in position.

Mama, Mama, Mama!

Shh!

[speaking in Afrikaans]

Good boy, go.

[tense music]

It was Mark,

in Grabouw, that I was with.

Just needed to blow off some steam, I guess.

Do you wanna talk about it?

Look, I don't need my PhD in psychology

to know something's wrong.

I upped and left you

and you were stuck holding it all together.

I don't wanna talk about it here.

Why not?

Erika, for God's sake, just tell me what's going on.

Okay.

How about I broke up with my fiance.

How about I was the one who lost the apartment.

How about in the midst of all that,

I had to bury my dead mother,

my own mother

who didn't even recognise her daughter in the end.

I mean, I'm losing my mind too, Micki,

but I knew that if it got that bad, I would go to you,

only you didn't come to me.

You just...

You just let yourself spiral and took it all on yourself.

I mean, what is that?

Catholic guilt?

Look, I...

I know that you're my boss, but...

We talk, don't we?

Yeah.

Just don't lose your mind again

without at least giving me a warning.

Okay.

He's good help then?

Mark?

Yeah.

While I was there,

then you get back and it's all still going on.

I dunno, being with someone, doing what we do,

do you think it's even possible?

[Erika chuckling]

You're asking the wrong person.

[chuckling]

I dunno.

Maybe it's the only thing that makes it possible.

[tense music]

Bravo in position.

Visual on the suspect's premises.

Awaiting your signal, Alpha team, over.

[Pieter] All teams standby.

[tense music]

[tense music building]

Police!

[woman screaming]

- Police! - Get down, now!

Calm down.

[Officer] Room here, no sign of the suspect.

Door's open.

Back door's open!

Bravo, are you there?

[grunting]

Ah!

We've got visual!

I see him, he...

Micki, come in, Micki.

He's heading for you, repeat, he's heading south.

We think he's using the alleyway.

Received, received!

Pieter?

Pieter, which direction?

[tense music]

Which...

Micki!

Micki!

Look, just cover me.

[tense music]

[tense music continues]

[Officer] Police, stop!

Stop!

[shouting]

[tense music]

Police, police, stay down.

Hands where I can see them.

Let me see your hands.

Yeah, we have him.

Repeat, we have the suspect, over.

Get down.

Don't move.

[tense music fading]

[sirens]

[tense music]

You have the right to be informed

of the charges on which you've been arrested.

You have the right to remain silent.

You do have the right to be promptly informed

of the consequences.

Should you choose not to remain silent,

any information uttered

or given freely to a police officer

can be used against you in court.

[tense music]

He is a good young man.

Kind.

I'm afraid we've been following your son

for quite a while.

What we're afraid he's done...

Done what?

Working the sugar fields?

Providing for us?

No, of course not.

Please, sit down.

He could have been anything he wanted,

but he chooses to stay and help me.

Is it just the two of you at home?

Me, his sister.

He looks after us.

But, um...

Well, does he have a wife or a girlfriend maybe?

He was too good for her anyway.

Why do you say that?

There is nobody, just us, family.

Thank you.

Someone will be in shortly.

No, no, that's not the problem.

He's back from the district surgeon

and they certified he wasn't assaulted in the arrest.

Problem is he's not talking.

At all?

Confirmed his name.

Other than that, all he says he is got the wrong guy.

We have enough evidence.

No, the DNA match we have is just basic.

It was an old sample.

Defence will make a case against it.

They're still searching the house, but there's nothing.

You know this guy.

I mean, you know him inside.

I need an admission of guilt

and it's not a request, it's an order.

Get me a confession, Micki.

[tense music]

This is Dr. Micki Pistorius,

a doctor of the mind.

She's here to assess you.

[tense music]

You don't wanna talk?

Okay.

I'd like to tell you a story.

Would that be okay?

It's about a young man.

Yeah, he's born with a clever mind,

sensitive, inquisitive,

and he reads, pushes himself to learn,

but he's also stifled by where he's born

and by everyone's low expectations of him.

He wants to be something, but he's powerless.

So what does he do?

He makes do, plays their game,

works, lives, finds someone to love,

but then that someone he loves,

someone he trusts, hurts him,

deeply,

betrays him,

and the foundations he's been building just...

Evaporate.

For a man, that betrayal fuses all the wiring inside him.

Now he sees a young girl in the street

and he feels something new.

He wants her,

but in a way he doesn't quite understand.

To have all of her totally in his control.

And he speaks to her,

promises her work in town

and offers to escort her there using the plantation roads.

He even suggests a shortcut through the fields themselves,

and it's once they're in the cane, the sound of the leaves,

the world left behind, that something takes over.

He takes a rock

and she's on the ground unconscious,

he pulls her hands behind her

and ties them with the balls of clothing he's prepared,

then he sits on her hand and ties her feet.

He gags her mouth with a ball of clothing,

ties a cord around her neck

and he has sex with her,

and he kills her.

For a moment, he feels right,

only it never lasts.

He knows...

It will just go on and on.

It was me.

I'm the man that killed them in the cane fields.

The man in your story.

[tense music]

And are you ready to talk to an officer?

[tense music continues]

I got it.

[tense music continues]

So, you used bindings that you, what?

That you prepared earlier?

Yeah.

[Pieter] From?

Just anything.

Can use a cloth,

something can rot away fast.

Okay.

And then you tie up the feet and...

No, it's hands first,

always tie the hands behind, like we do with sugar cane,

the same way we tie, 'cause I used to practise every night.

Can you show us?

- All right. - You can demonstrate on me.

[tense music]

Okay.

Good, come.

[tense music]

All right, all right, I think that's enough.

Sit down.

So, they're already unconscious from the blow, hmm?

Why tie them up?

Must ask her.

Tomorrow you'll take us to all the places this happened.

[eerie music]

It's over there.

That's nine for nine.

Yeah.

I want this guy in the Magistrates today,

before he has a change of heart.

Mm.

No, I don't think he'll make things difficult for us now.

[tense music]

What will happen now?

You'll be moved to a jail while you await trial.

My report will say that you were well oriented,

that you knew what you were doing.

I saw you before all of this.

I was watching you in a cane field, looking down on you,

the prayer, the flowers.

Who is it that hurt you?

We were engaged.

She became pregnant.

I was so happy,

then she decide she want more than what I can give.

She didn't want the cane field, she wanted the city,

so she killed my baby.

Every woman I pick, when I look them, I see her.

And you really think that makes it acceptable?

Only reason that you catch me

is because I leave the body in the same place,

'cause I want the families to have a peace.

I wanted to stop.

But you didn't.

There's one mistake in your story, small.

When I gag them, I take a cloth first

and roll it and put inside my mouth

to make a shape, before I put inside them.

[tense music]

[Micki] I should have known that.

- No. - I should have.

No, if I'd have worked it out,

we could have used the saliva weeks ago.

Micki--

You would've matched the DNA to the blood sample,

you would've taken him off the streets.

I should've been more focused!

Stop.

We did a good thing, Micki.

Okay.

[pensive music]

[upbeat music playing]

Hey.

I...

Just wanted to say thanks.

- Cheers. - Cheers.

So you'll be back in Pretoria now?

For good, I guess.

Yeah, but only in the morning.

[spluttering]

[giggling]

Um...

Yeah.

[giggling]

[phone ringing]

Mark, is that you?

[Mark] Micki?

Hi.

Oh, I'm so glad you called.

I was just thinking about you.

Is everything okay?

Yeah.

Yes, we got the guy.

We got him.

Great, that's great.

Yeah.

Yeah, I thought maybe we could celebrate when I'm back.

I could cook.

Or something else.

Micki, I called because I was worried.

You left in such a rush, your phone wasn't connecting,

I thought you'd at least let me know when you got back.

I'm sorry I left you.

Me too.

Uh, um...

I fly tomorrow, can I call you then?

Yeah, sure.

Yeah.

Night, Mark.

[sombre music]

[sombre music continues]

[soft eerie music]