One of Criminal Minds' dirtiest crimes yet is getting a good sudsing. Former Guiding Light icon Robert Newman — who played Josh to Kim Zimmer's Reva — guest stars Wednesday (9/8c, CBS) as a small-town Indiana sheriff who butts heads with the BAU team over the murder of three women and the abduction of a fourth.

"The victims are all strippers who vanish after work — it turns out they've been raped, killed and dumped in cornfields," reports Newman, hinting that his character — a hardnosed ex-Marine who still sports a buzz cut — "reveals some pretty surprising twists and turns." Especially when Hotch (Thomas Gibson) confronts the guy about a leak: Evidence suggests that someone in the sheriff's office is in league with the killers.

The grisly episode, which also features soap queen Melissa Claire Egan (the love-to-hate-her Annie on All My Children), seems to be a good omen for the East Coast-based Newman. The actor has given himself eight weeks to see if there's enough primetime interest in him in L.A. to warrant a move.