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In this episode, there is a sequence where we can see Columbo running towards the airport to meet the suspect. And we can observe that the detective is a very good runner, especially for his age.

Then, if you want to be sure to catch the criminal, you must firmly focus on a single clue. The coffee thermos, which could not be recovered after the plane crash, constituted the most important evidence. However, the suspect was about to escape, being the most cunning criminal, but he made a mistake at the end and took the car keys with him to the airport. Considering he was supposed to return to town only in about a month, it made no sense to take the car keys with him unless he planned to return much sooner (like the next day).

Columbo set a trap for him, told him a lie, that is, he induced a little uncertainty by telling him that the police would search the entire perimeter of the plane crash to find the parachute or the thermos. But in fact, he had no intention of doing so. Luckily, the suspect felt the uncertainty and, out of fear, returned the next night to the crash site.

Columbo almost let the criminal escape. I think that's the conclusion: sometimes the trick to catching a criminal is to use a lie, to induce a state of uncertainty, so that they make a mistake. But you have to pay attention to the small clues the criminal will leave around him, clues that will be revealed to you by looking at other people or other phenomena around.

Columbo had a vague suspicion, a kind of intuition that made him thirst for the truth: the lock on the door of the office where the crime was committed. To be sure of his intuition, he puts the magician to a test: in the middle of the show, he asks the magician to unlock his handcuffs. And when the Magician manages to unlock his handcuffs, then Columbo knew for sure that he was the criminal, because someone who knows how to unlock handcuffs certainly knows how to open a door lock.

All Columbo had to do next was to find the motive for the crime, the connection between the victim and the magician, but especially the way the Magician acted in order to not be seen while committing the crime. Throughout the episode, we learn various ways in which magical bodies are realized.

So, if you want to solve a case of magic, you must transform yourself into a magician. Throughout the film, Columbo becomes an expert in magic tricks and proves to be more inspired than the real magician. To catch a magician, you have to follow the thread of his tricks, but in such a way as not to fall prey to his illusions. Moreover, you have to become an illusion yourself, an unexpected effect of the way you build reality, so that no one else suspects.

Then, there is the novice detective, Sergeant Wilson. Being a novice means being a beginner or lacking experience in a certain field or activity. In the given example, Sergeant John J. Wilson proves to be a novice because he does not focus on the important details of the crime, but on less relevant aspects, such as where Detective Columbo leaves his coat. Wherever he meets Columbo, he brings with him Columbo's forgotten coat from various places. This suggests that John J. Wilson lacks the experience or skills necessary to solve cases effectively. So, in general, being a novice means being at the beginning of a path or career and having a lot to learn and develop.

Secondly,

To uncover clues about a potential criminal, you must pay close attention to what happens around you in places other than where the crime occurred. For instance, Columbo accidentally notices that one of his colleagues at the police station has a wet shirt back due to sweating. This suggests that he was sitting at a desk, with his back against the chair's backrest (which is how condensation forms). Consequently, the murdered person also must have been sitting, as he was found dead with a wet shirt back. Columbo tells the sergeant to note: "Now we know for sure that the victim was sitting. The next question: where was he sitting?

Furthermore, when looking for clues, you should frequently return to the crime scene, trying to put yourself in the victim's place. There were several chairs in the room. However, Columbo intuits that the victim was sitting at a desk, due to the glasses and the glass of wine on the desk. And when you type, you wear glasses. Yes, you wear reading glasses if you're typing, but there was no paper in the typewriter. There were no written documents on the desk or in the drawers. Nothing in this room indicates that the man was writing at the machine.

Then Columbo looks more closely at the typewriter. He notices something curious. What is this? It looks like a golf ball. This ball prints the letters, but it doesn't move. This is the carriage, but this typewriter doesn't have one like that. You see, the ball moves from left to right. See this? This is a single-use carbon ribbon for a very clear image.

Colombo reveals to Santini the most important clue and evidence: "You didn't look closely enough at that typewriter. If you had, you would have seen that it used a plastic carbon ribbon. A single-use carbon ribbon, sir, the kind you don't reuse. And when the key hits the ribbon, it produces a letter that is clearly visible on the used ribbon. And if we roll back the entire used section of the ribbon, we see what Mr. Jerome typed."

In conclusion, to find out who the criminal is, you need to look for clues about the motive of the crime. And the clue to the crime is not in plain sight; it is hidden around the place where the crime was committed. Often, you need an assistant who knows how certain things work that you are not familiar with. For example, Columbo knew next to nothing about the typewriter, nor about its writing mechanism. But Sergeant Wilson had worked with such a typewriter model while he was a student at the police academy. He knew everything about the machine.

A fitting saying for finding clues is an old one from Marcus Aurelius: "Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? What does that thing hide?"

Grace Wheeler Willis, a successful woman. People like her can never truly know which parts of themselves are really their own. They become increasingly confused, blurred by what they have, aspiring only to what they have inherited. She has within her all the undigested bits of other people that the rich call their personality. Her illness is the result of the example of a life full of success, the outcome of an exasperated Ego, craving for success. Only the crime and her husband's money would have allowed her to shine in the glory forged by this superior Ego, otherwise no one would have admired her. She lived with the certainty of an endless future in which honors and love were due.

In the end, Columbo reveals to her close one (her manager and lover at the same time), Raymond, the fact that Mrs. Grace Wheeler Willis is the author of the crime, but at the same time she suffers from a severe illness, related to the brain and memory, and has only two months to live. So the ending is uncertain: will she be arrested, or not? It's too tempting to say that retrospection brings clarity, in her case. In fact, as Columbo states: "I don't even think she remembers the crime she committed." The crime has become a sign of her irritated nerves, rather than something real.

However, Columbo's face at the end expresses sadness, which leads me to believe that he feels sorry for her, understands her illness, and is most likely to let her live her life further, with her enormous desire for success, because anyway, she doesn't have much left to live. Or, maybe it would have been better for her at a center with people suffering from mental illnesses. But her future is uncertain.

Yet, this is the only episode in which Columbo evades the law, committing a so-called "serious crime", precisely bribery. In practice, he calls on another policeman, a friend, and asks him to present himself in his place at the shooting range with his documents. A kind of illicit identity swap. Although it is his duty as a policeman to present himself at the shooting range, it seems that the police had on record that Columbo had not been to the range for 10 years, and above all, he did not carry a gun (another crime). Columbo secretly hands a $50 bill to his friend, to present himself with false documents in his place at the range.

From here emerges the interesting, positive fact: Columbo does not love firearms at all, because his most powerful weapon is his mind.