Valerie Naff is the tragic antagonist from "Payback", episode 4.11 of CSI: Miami.
She was portrayed by Michelle Nolden.
Biography[]
Backstory[]
Six years prior to the episode's events, Valerie was raped by real estate agent Jeff Colson; in the very home that Jeff got for Valerie. She never saw her attacker that night, only feeling him on her, and she was quickly convinced that her attacker was mover Brian Lexington, with Jeff falsely making the claim. As a result, Brian was convicted of the assault, and served six years in prison.
Role[]
The beginning of the episode had Lexington fully exonerated due to Natalia Boa Vista's lab work, and afterwards, Valerie was shown confronting Horatio Caine, as she wanted to know who it was who really attacked her all those years ago. She was later shown with Brian, as he was attempting to sue for his wrongful incarceration, with Valerie also being named. It was after this that Valerie realized the truth: Jeff was her rapist. Seeing Jeff's face plastered everywhere in advertisements angered her, and later on, Valerie confronted Jeff and blasted him for lying to her. She later picked up a statue and beat Jeff to death, after which she left the scene. Jeff's body was found after the lab confirmed that he was Valerie's rapist, leading to Horatio confronting Valerie figuring that she was out for revenge.
Valerie claimed that she was home alone at the time of the murder, but after she is spotted on TV publicly recanting her accusations against Brian, Horatio confronts her again, accusing Brian of murder and Valerie of covering for him. Horatio's original hunch turned out to be correct in the episode's climax, as during his and Frank Trigg's questioning of Brian's lawyer, he realized that the killer didn't have the upper body strength to lift the statue, meaning that the killer was a woman. Horatio later met Valerie, who confessed to killing Jeff, stating that no amount of money could make up for what happened to her, while voicing her anger over Jeff's actions. Valerie was eventually arrested for her villainous actions (off-screen), but not before Horatio sympathetically promised to be with her every step of the way.