The Boiler Room Job - Recap

Greg “The Mako” Sherman sets up a “boiler room” for his callers and explains to his new team that suckers deserve to lose their money. He demonstrates how to sucker a client by calling a woman and giving his personal guarantee that he’ll triple her money for the school.



Agent McSweeten and his current partner, Agent Bob, close in on Greg. As they proceed, McSweeten explains that Taggert was bitten by ferrets and is still in the hospital. They break into Greg’s old boiler room... and discover that he’s long gone. All he left is a note saying “maybe next time.”

Later, Sheila comes to see Nate and Sophie and explains that she lost her special-need school’s funds and the police couldn’t do anything about it. Her school will close in three months if they don’t recover the money.

Everyone but Parker meets for a briefing, and she’s at a chocolate convention. Alec explains that Greg is the grandson of the Yellow Kid, the greatest grifter of all time. Greg has no scruples and no conscience, and is running an inverted pyramid scheme, convincing people he can predict the market. In each room he sets up a boiler room of experts and makes thousands of calls. Nate says that they can’t con a con artist so they’re just going to have to steal from Greg.

Greg recruits a new team of callers and starts winnowing them down. Alec is one of them and Sophie secretly talks him through impressing Greg. Alec goes to work and takes the clients’ money... and then secretly transfer it back when Greg isn’t looking.



When Parker returns, she’s wound up on sugar from the chocolate festival. Alec calls in and says that he can’t find Greg’s off-shore bank accounts until he transfers some funds. Greg and his driver Hafolo come in and reveals that he knows who Alec is and figures he’s pulling a cyber-heist. Nate tells Alec to say that he’s not stealing, and Alec explains that he’s parking commodity proxies in his accounts. When Greg asks what commodity, Parker jumps in and says “chocolate.” Alec instinctively repeats it and Greg figures that he’s working on cocoa futures. Alec claims that the mogul he works for is nicknamed “Count Chocula.” Greg wants to meet Chocula and Alec has no choice but to agree to a meeting the next day at 9 a.m.

The next day, Sophie goes to see Edward Travers of the Travers investment firm. She claims to be with a UK brokerage firm and the IRS is cooperating with her on the IRS. Once they send Travers out, they move in. Nate finds Sophie changing in the office and helps her into her new dress, and suggests that he undress. He then tells Eliot to stall Greg in the lobby. Greg suspects something is up but finds nothing on the janitor’s cart. Alec introduces Greg to Nate, but Nate tells Greg to get out before they spook his visitor. As they go, they spot Sophie in the lobby. Nate “fires” Alec and says he’ll pay him his $200,000 later. Greg wonders why Nate would pay $200,000 just for someone to park proxies, and Alec says it must be worth it. As Nate meets with Sophie, Alec tells Greg that she’s the “Chocolate Whisperer.”



The team proceeds to steal a chocolate festival, planting Sophie’s name on the Internet to convince the attendees that she’s a world-famous chocolate taster. Parker is there as a server assisting Sophie. Greg and Hafolo follow Sophie to the festival and watch as everyone admires her as a celebrity. Greg steals Parker’s PDA to check on Sophie, and Parker can’t resist stealing Hafolo’s wallet and taking his credit card.

The tasting contest begins and Sophie is matched against Laverne Webber, the reigning champion. Laverne goes first and identifies the chocolate’s origin. She misses out on the purity and Sophie goes next. She first identifies it as from Trinidad, but Laverne accuses her of guessing. Alec pulls up the characteristics on Trinidad cocoa beans, but Nate says that it isn’t necessary. Sophie identifies it perfectly on her own, upstaging Laverne.



After the contest, Sophie ignores Greg and meets with a Chinese representative. Hafolo translates and informs his boss that they’re planning to open chocolate cafes in China. Greg figures that cocoa futures will skyrocket as a result. He and his man capture Nate, take him to a secret location, and demand to know what he’s up to. Nate explains that a report on cocoa futures is going to be released and he knows that it’s going to be wrong when it says that supply is normal. Greg points out that Nate is sleeping with Sophie, based on their body language when he saw her earlier. Parker and Alec, listening in, look at Sophie, who tries to deny it. Nate says he has a guy who knows things, and he’ll continue buying cocoa futures for a month until people find out the truth. Then he’ll announce China and make $100 million.

After Nate is released, he goes back to the bar. Sophie and Parker wonder why Sophie and Nate didn’t tell them about their relationship. The couple table the discussion and Nate insists that Greg is about ready to bite and they have to keep him off balance by pushing him. Then they’ll run a big store scam, and use civilians so that Greg doesn’t spot any con men. The next step involves Eliot taking Greg to Ecuador. Meanwhile, the others set up the big store. Parker gets monitors while Sophie interviews amateurs. Nate tries to explain to one of their new recruits that they’ll be running a moonwalking bear con, but the woman, Mrs. Cox, doesn’t quite get it. Parker brings in the monitors, having used Hafolo’s credit card to buy them. Alec continues to check Greg’s computer systems.

Eliot, pretending to be a local, escorts Greg through the jungle to the cocoa field. He claims that the local government is cutting down the trees for timber, depriving the cocoa of the shade it needs.



Greg returns to his boiler room and has his agents buy up timber futures. He then calls Nate, who figures that Greg is going to start drawing on his personal accounts to get enough money. Greg tells Nate that he wants in and Nate demands $10 million. Nate wants the money on his trading floor within 12 hours and Greg agrees.

While Alec continues working, the others rehearse with their new recruits at the fake “big store” office. It doesn’t go well. Meanwhile, Alec reports that he still hasn’t found anything. Greg and Hafolo arrive and they go live. Greg gives Nate a case: an empty case. He boasts that he knew all along that Nate was conning him. When Nate points out that he hasn’t made any money, Greg explains that he used Nate’s story, leaked it to the market, and then bought up $30 million in cocoa futures. He’ll make $100 million and escape to a country without extradition to the U.S.



When Greg reminds Nate that it’s impossible to con a con man, Nate tells him that he didn’t. They didn’t risk a con, and Greg was so focused that he missed plan A: Alec’s cyber heist. Alec tracked the $30 million and stole it. Greg calls and Alec confirms that it was moved. McSweeten and his men arrive and arrest all of Greg’s workers. The agent takes the phone and informs Greg that he’s under arrest for 47 charges of securities fraud.

At the big store, Hafolo makes a run for it and throws a punch at Eliot. Happy that he gets to throw a punch, Eliot knocks him out. Agent Bob arrives to arrest Greg, and Greg demands to know who all the shills are. Nate explains that they’re all Greg’s victims, including Sheila. Agent Bob and his men arrive to arrest Greg and pass on a haiku from McSweeten to Parker. When Greg wonders what they’re doing, Agent Bob insists that the Leverage team are undercover FBI agents, and they haul the ranting con man away.



Later at the bar, Sheila thanks the team but wonders why there is a million dollars in the account instead of $72,000. Nate says that her school will be fine. The others then ask Nate and Sophie about their relationship, insisting that they need to be able to rely on each other. Nate says that their emotions are fine and Sophie says that they’re just friends with benefits. Nate isn’t comfortable with her dismissing their relationship so casually.

After checking the compute records, Alec tells Nate that the man who bugged their apartment and called Nate is Jack Latimer. Latimer worked himself up from nothing to a major investor. He invested in Verd Agra but has also been connected to other companies that the team has taken down. Nate figures that Latimer’s out for revenge, but Alec says that Latimer hasn’t lost any money.

Nate goes to see Latimer, who explains that his investors had funds in Pierson Aviation. He saw Nate dealing with Dubenich but kept silent. Latimer explains that Nate and his team are a market correction, and he’s spent three years tracking them down and predicting their actions. Each time the team went up against a company, Latimer invested against them. Nate tells him to get out of his business, but Latimer offers to provide him with crooked companies that have covered up their activities so well that the team will never find them out. All Latimer wants in return is 24 hours of notice to make his move. Nate walks away without a word, while Latimer asks if his pride is more important than helping people.



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