Bomb Squad

History[]

Raid on the Wilson Steel Plant[]

However, when Eric deduced the true meaning behind Jigsaw's message, he was able to identify the killer's hideout at the Wilson Steel Plant, due to an engraving on Michael's mask. The next day, Eric decided to accompany his former partner, Detective Kerry, and a SWAT team led by Sergeant Daniel Rigg during their raid on the plant. Rigg, who had been at Wilson Steel at one point already, instructed his men. Minutes later, they went to the plant. Following Detective Kerry's orders, Officer Pete Baker was the first one who broke through a side door and entered the building along with Rigg and two of their teammates.

While making their way through a storage area of the building, the men soon reached a staircase surrounded by a chain-link cage. Since the door was secured by a chain, Baker cut it with a bolt clipper. Upon opening the door, the lights in the staircase suddenly turned on. Baker entered the staircase, followed by his two teammates, while Rigg backed them up. They tried to climb the stairs but eventually stopped when they heard a squealing sound. Seconds later, a mechanical ventriloquist puppet appeared at the head of the stairs, sitting on a tricycle and maniacally laughing at them. After the staircase was locked by a mechanism, Officer Baker tried to approach the puppet, when suddenly, a rigged step sprang forward and broke his shins, causing his two fellow officers to back away, before receiving a lethal electric shock when they touched the cage. As they were killed in front of Sergeant Rigg's eyes, the puppet slowly rode back on the cycle. When Rigg called for reinforcement, the remaining SWAT team, as well as Eric and Kerry, entered the building. While the detectives and Rigg went upstairs, Pete's colleagues dragged him out of the staircase. (Saw II)

Eric's Test[]

Moments later, they finally found the Jigsaw Killer, John Kramer, who was anticipating their arrival. Rigg immediately ordered his men to arrest him, but they refused to do so when John told Eric it'd the best if John stayed where he was until Eric took care of his problem. He instructed Eric to watch the surveillance monitors in the next room, to which Kerry, Rigg, and Eric then entered the room. Upon looking at the monitors, they saw what appeared to be another one of Jigsaw's games and recognized one of the eight victims as Eric's son, Daniel. However, they didn't know that the footage was pre-recorded and assumed that the events were unfolding live. After seeing the recording of the game, Eric immediately attempted to attack John and angrily yelled at him before being held back by Rigg. John then explained to Eric the rules of his test. Eric's colleagues had to leave the room while Eric merely had to sit down and talk to John for a period of two hours until a timer went off. If he could successfully do that, he'd eventually see his son again. Otherwise, his son and the other prisoners would be killed by a deadly nerve agent.

Eric then unsuccessfully tried to call his son, as he was hoping that Jigsaw was only bluffing. Kerry tried to calm Eric down. However, this attempt remained unsuccessful as Eric got more and more nervous, especially when the first victim, Gus Colyard, was killed by a booby trap only a few minutes after the game began. On Rigg's advice, Kerry called for a tech team to trace back the video broadcast. After a talk with John Kramer, Eric told his colleagues about his ultimatum: In order to save his son he had to just sit down and talk to John until the end of the game. Kerry got into an argument with Rigg, who suggested to grill John about the victims' whereabouts by using violence. She told him this wouldn't work, stating that John fits a certain psychological profile. Eventually, Eric reluctantly agreed to John's challenge and conversed with him while Kerry kept an eye on the progress of the game. However, when talking to him, Eric placed a walkie-talkie beneath his chair so his colleagues were able to listen to their conversation.

When they began to talk to each other, John introduced himself to Eric by his name. However when Eric asked him if he shouldn't rather call him "Jigsaw", John claimed that this nickname came from the police and the press, not from him. Furthermore he revealed the true meaning of the jigsaw pieces which he cut from his deceased victims' skins and that gave him his nickname. They were a symbol of an important piece of the "human puzzle" that the victims, who failed their tests, were missing in John's opinion: the survival instinct. He also told Eric about his attempted suicide after he was diagnosed with cancer and how his survival of this event caused him to start his mission. During their conversation, he frequently provoked Eric by talking about his violent behavior towards a suspect approximately five years ago and the bad relationship he had with his son after he cheated on his wife with Kerry. By telling him the truth about his self-imposed mission and confronting him with his past mistakes, John wanted Eric to understand him and his work.

When the second victim in the house, Obi Tate, died in his trap, Rigg persisted on using violence to force John to tell them about the house, as they were just wasting time in his opinion, but Kerry insisted on keeping the situation calm as long as possible. However, Eric became more and more distressed as the game went on, and the tech team was running late, which caused Kerry to formulate a new plan. As she thought John was proud about his work and that it meant everything to him, she told Eric to threaten to destroy all of John's construction plans and notes in the hideout. Eric followed through, but was in turn only provoked by John, who was rarely impressed by Eric's outburst of rage, which only ended when he received his instructions from Kerry after the tech team finally arrived. As Eric refused to play the game and talk to John any longer, the latter told him and his colleagues to look in the desk located in the same room as the monitors. As Kerry did so, she found a bunch of files of old cases, which were the files of the seven other prisoners in the house. Eric ultimately recognized them as the people he had framed throughout his career and realized that they were about to find out the truth about Daniel.

When the game in the house got out of control as one of the victims, Xavier, started to kill the other prisoners and pursued Daniel and Amanda, Eric brutally beat John up to make him reveal Daniel's whereabouts. Kerry tried to stop him, but she was held back by Rigg. Heavily injured, John ultimately offered to take him to the house when Eric threatened him with his gun, but demanded to go there with Eric alone. Eric agreed and left the building with John in a hidden elevator. Pursued by the SWAT officers, Eric and John took one of their armored vehicles to flee. While on their way, John told Eric how to get to the Nerve Gas House, where the game was taking place. Meanwhile, Kerry sent the SWAT team after them while she stayed with the tech team, who traced the video feed back to an address at 237 North Hyde Crescent shortly afterwards. However, when Rigg and his team arrived there, they realized that the game was already over and the video feed was merely a recording, so Kerry told the team to come back. As the timer went off, a safe in John's hideout suddenly opened and revealed Daniel Matthews, who had been locked up in the safe all along. (Saw II)

Raid on the Elementary School[]

Six months later, Rigg and his team were called to a school after the police had received an emergency call about an explosion. This was in fact the same school where Rigg had assaulted Rex years ago. When they entered the building, they discovered that the door of one of the classrooms had been welded shut. Ultimately, they managed to break through a door by using a blowpipe. Upon entering and securing the room, they found the torn up remains of Troy, a man who was killed by a nail bomb during one of Jigsaw's games. Rigg then ordered one of his men to call Kerry, and upon arrival, she immediately feared that the victim was Eric. However, her partner, Detective Hoffman, who was investigating the crime scene, told her it wasn't him. Nonetheless, Kerry was sure that the murder could have something to do with Eric. Therefore, Rigg tried to calm her down and reminded her that Eric was a missing person case, not a homicide case, and assured her that his abduction wasn't her fault. Rigg was also confused as to how Jigsaw had been able to set up the trap, due to his bad physical condition during their last confrontation. Kerry, however, doubted that Jigsaw was actually responsible for the murder, after she learned that the SWAT team had to cut open the door, as it was welded shut, giving Troy no chance to escape even if he would've passed his test. This lead her to the conclusion that someone else was responsible for the game. Seconds later, a member of the forensic team told her that the video tape containing the instructions for Troy's trap was still intact despite the explosion. (Saw III)

Evan's Test[]

A few weeks later, Rogers was called to Pete's Auto Body, a junkyard at 58th Street, after the police had been informed about a car accident at the junkyard. However, when Rogers arrived at the scene, he quickly realized that the supposed accident was actually another Jigsaw trap, which had taken the lives of Evan, Kara, Dan and Jake, a group of four racist skinheads. Therefore, he immediately called Gibson, who ordered him not to let anyone to the crime scene, including the homicide division. When Gibson arrived at the scene, he immediately listened to the audio tape, which had contained the instructions for Evan. The tape however was severely damaged. Therefore, Gibson gave it to one of the forensics for further examination. After that, he discussed the new situation with Rogers as it was suspicious that the new game had been played in such a rather public place. While Rogers assumed that Hoffman just wanted to put on a show, Gibson was convinced that there was more behind it. Afterwards, he took a look at the severely humiliated corpses of the other three victims, Kara, Dan and Jake, and ordered a coroner to send them to the morgue as they had to be abducted immediately. Suddenly, he was called to an adjacent toilet room by Rogers. Upon entering, he saw the words "Gibson, See For Yourself" written on a mirror in red letters. Furthermore, he found a blood-smeared metallic trap device left there by Hoffman and ordered Rogers to send it to the lab, hoping that fingerprints might be found on it. (Saw 3D)

Cat-and-Mouse Game[]

Shortly afterwards, the lab actually found fingerprints on the trap and identified them as those of Jill Tuck. Due to the latest events, he decided to take Jill into protective custody and brought her to a safe house for key witnesses. However, he was angry at her as she hadn't told him that Hoffman was chasing her because she tried to kill him earlier. Nonetheless, he was willing to keep his promise to protect her and promised her that she was save at this location. However, only moments later, Officer Palmer informed him about a disc sent to them, which was personally addressed to Jill. He then received a call from Rogers, who informed him about an explosion at the junkyard. Seconds later, Gibson heard another detonation in the background. Therefore, he told him to let the bomb squad search the junkyard before they went on with their investigation. Afterwards, he ordered Palmer to play the disc. The disc contained a video message recorded by Hoffman. In this message, he told Gibson to give Jill to him. In return, he promised to end the next game. If Gibson refused to take the offer, Hoffman threatened him that everyone would die. As Hoffman knew Jill's location, Gibson ordered Palmer to take Jill to one of the detention cells on the basement of the police station.