Guest star Teri Polo previously appeared as one of the characters introduced in the final season of Northern Exposure (1990), to help fill the void left as star Rob Morrow was being phased out due to contract disputes.
This episode is carefully written to avoid any direct references to Mormons or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. However, the subject of polygamy and numerous oblique references in dialogue make it clear that the Stone cult is intended to be derived from Mormonism, most likely the Fundamentalist offshoot known as FLDS, whose "prophet" Warren Jeffs had been arrested August 28, 2006 (just a few months before this episode) after spending some time on the FBI's most-wanted list. Jeffs is believed to have had as many as 78 wives at the time of his death, including one that had been as young as 12 at the time of their marriage just a couple years before.
The brief scene in which Abner Stone kills a police officer who has pulled over his SUV was shot on a stretch of road that was also due to be used the same night by a crew from the TV show Big Love (2006), but "Big Love" canceled their shoot because the weather was unusually cold for Southern California that evening. Both this episode of Numb3rs (2005) and the series "Big Love" feature Anne Dudek playing a member of a fundamentalist polygamous cult.
The surname "Kirtland" figures prominently in the polygamist cult depicted. This is an inside reference to Kirtland, Ohio, where a Latter-day Saint community once thrived under Joseph Smith, to whom polygamist groups as well as mainstream Mormons trace their origins.
Teri Polo and Joshua Malina both starred in The West Wing (1999). Julie Hébert, who wrote and directed this episode, also directed several episodes of "The West Wing".