Interesting observations steve. Brimmer's "state of the art" security company, complete with company cars and metal detectors, but nobody noticed columbo or one of his co-horts plant the contact lense (which raises another question - how did he open the trunk of brimmer's car) nor did anyone see him in the garage. Obviously the car was put out of service while it was at Brimmer's parkinig lot.
And I think you may be right also on the voluntary manslaughter thing. One of the stipulations of voluntary manslaughter states "Killing as a result of provocation." Not premeditated.
He didn't call police right away ... he went out of his way to misrepresent a wrongful death, and that's what turned a manslaughter into murder ... just as Nick and Lilian did in "Dagger".
Yeah, there's just no realistic way Columbo could have pulled a stunt like that without being noticed by somebody, but the one aspect of this ep that always bothered me was the amateurishly LAME way a man of Brimmer's calibre would dispose of the body.
I mean, such unreasonable absurdity is precisely why Columbo believed Mrs. Norris in the other one!
In rare episodes such as "Death Lends a Hand" in which the murder is unpremeditated, it is usually and understandably written into the script that the killer is up to something else which is illegal, unethical, or both. Brimmer was being very out of line in trying to blackmail Mrs. Kennicutt into supplying exclusive information. He tried to be remorseful about it at the end, which is unusual.
Funny you mentioned mrs. norris - I just watched that episode last night :) Robert Culp did a good job. I had to laugh when they were at the supermarket, and his associate says "S hould I stay with the woman in the red?" And Dr. Kepple replies, "No, stay with the little guy in the rumpled raincoat." Classic columbo quote!!
i always agreed that that was one of the worst body removals ive ever seen...no class and brimmer couldve done better...another question, how come we never see brimmer's top detective anymore after he was sent away when columbo started suspecting him??? it was a loose end...no resolution...
Sabra, if you recall in the episode when Columbo visits the guy atthe country club, and he states "I think we were being followed. Although I never really saw anyone, there was this one guy...crew cut, ex-marine type."
Now one of Brimmer's "goons" phones him from the car phone and tells him that Columbo and the golf instructor (whose name eludes me, BRAIN DAMAGE), are together talking, that's when Brimmer calls Leo and sends him off on that special assignment. I think Brimmer did that so Columbo wouldn't be able to speak to Leo about the fact he was tailing Mrs. Kinnecutt.
I wonder if Leo is still on that special assignment? Wouldn't you be ticked off if you got sent to the far end of the earth and your company went under with the arrest of the CEO? I hope he had airfare home?
Talking about disposing of the corpus delecti I always thought Edddie Albert was taking a big risk with the body being hidden in the wall of his house ("Dead Weight").
By the way, I think I saw on "Mythbusters" that a potato in a car exhaust will not immobolise it. Is that true? Anybody tried it?