FBI season 8, episode 20 had the team back together as they worked on a murder case involving Susan Granwell, who came from a background in hotel management. How did the team determine who killed her?
As successful as the Granwell hotel chain was, the team found that there were recent issues that led to protests by employees of the hotel. At first, they thought the murder was orchestrated by one of the picket organizers. However, it appeared that he and Susan were secretly in love and engaged.
A murder involving crypto phishing was the focus of FBI season 8 episode 20
Only a few people knew about the engagement, one of whom was Susan’s son’s Math tutor, Lucas Williams. They checked his home and found his father deceased and his younger sister, Faith, missing. Once Maggie and OA found him after he attempted to pawn Susan’s expensive engagement ring, they learned someone had abducted his sister.
Lucas had learned about a crypto phishing scam and had used it to steal money. One day, he ended up stealing more than usual, and while he did spend it to pay off bills, the people he stole from discovered what he did. He had actually inadvertently stolen from the Russian Bratva, and the new New York clan was run by an old friend of Jubal’s, Andrei Ovechkin.
Jubal informed Isobel he had been in Moscow with his father for two years when he worked there, and he met Andrei in school. They became best friends and practically partners in crime. But after the Soviet Union collapsed, Andrei joined Bratva for survival and Jubal never spoke to him again.
In order to find out anything about the kidnapping, Jubal spoke with his old friend. Andrei revealed that the money stolen from his crypto wallet was small change to them, and they did not have anything to do with Faith’s abduction. He also revealed someone had doxxed Lucas’s information on a public forum.
This means anyone could have taken Faith, and the only way they could find out who the abductor was was to talk with the original poster who revealed Lucas’s information. They were able to send a fake bitcoin to the person’s wallet in exchange for proof that Faith was still alive.
Once they got it, one of the team members recognized an old style of building behind Faith and they were able to narrow down possible locations. Eva and Scola came across the abductors and were able to identify one, Simon Brumel. He wasn’t Bratva, but his father was, and apparently he was trying to make a name for himself to get noticed.
Andrei told Jubal he didn’t know anything about the girl’s abduction until after they spoke, telling him he was not involved. The kids involved likely wanted the money back in order to give it back to Andrei to get noticed. They set up a sting for Andrei to meet with two of the abductors, Nikolai and Ilia. Jubal and Scola were also present to make any arrests, but things were complicated when only Nikolai showed up.
After confronting him and telling him he would never be part of Bratva, Nikolai stabbed Andrei before Scola arrested him. They got him to reveal Ilia’s location, where they quickly apprehended him and rescued Faith.
Faith was reunited with Lucas, but it was a bittersweet reunion since he would have to go to prison and they now lost both of their parents. She would likely end up in foster care for a while, depending on the kind of sentence Lucas got for what happened.
Jubal checked on Andrei in the hospital where he was recovering from the stabbing. It was clear Jubal still cared about his old friend and wanted to help him get out. However, it looked like that was not going to happen, and it will be interesting to see what will happen the next time they meet and how this impacts their old friendship being on opposite sides of the law.
This was a good episode that gave us some more backstory about Jubal, and gave him an interesting adversary in the form of an old friend who isn’t exactly clean anymore. He was clearly emotionally invested but understood that there was a chance that they wouldn’t be on the same side anymore.
FBI airs Mondays on CBS at 9/8c. Episodes are available for streaming on Paramount+.
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