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| “ | When I wake up in the morning, I see Kelly's face. When I close my eyes, she's still there. I don't know how long I can go on like this... | „ |
| ~ Darlene Beckett having a breakdown. |
Darlene Beckett is one of the two main antagonists of the Criminal Minds episode "The Pact", alongside Ellen Russell. She is a vigilante serial killer who targets the men who raped and murdered her daughter, Kelly, along with Russell, who targets those responsible for the death of her nephew, Sam.
She was portrayed by actress/comedian Kim Wayans.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Darlene and her husband had an eight-year-old daughter, Kelly, who was kidnapped, raped, and murdered by a group of men. One of the rapists, Mark Taylor, was arrested, but because Kelly's body was never found, Taylor could not be charged with her murder, and served only 10 years for her rape; the other men were never caught. The tragedy destroyed her marriage, and she fell into a deep depression for which she sought help in a grief support group. There, she met Ellen Russell, whose two-year-old nephew, Sam, was killed by a drunk driver, a tragedy that drove her sister, Sam's mother, to commit suicide.
Darlene and Ellen bonded over their mutual grief and desire for revenge, and together they planned to kill the people who had taken their loved ones from them in the most painful way they could imagine, chaining them to the back of a car and dragging them across the pavement at top speed. They would "swap murders", killing the other's tormentors so they would not be connected to the crime. Darlene is the submissive partner in this killing team, as she he goes along with Ellen's plans, and, unlike Ellen, feels remorse for their crimes.
"The Pact"[]
Though hesitant, Darlene shows her commitment to the plan by kidnapping Brenda Wipley, the drunk driver who killed Sam, by posing as a man on a dating site and arranging a date via text message, knocking her unconscious when she shows up at the agreed place. Darlene and Ellen then chain her up to the back of Ellen's car, and Ellen tells Darlene to kill Wipley by dragging her across the pavement. Darlene cannot stand the thought of making someone suffer like that, however, so she kills Wipley quickly with a blow to the head with a shovel, and drags her body postmortem. While Darlene is horrified and stricken with guilt, she agrees to keep killing.
Ellen kidnaps Taylor, who had just been released from prison, and she and Darlene beat him while demanding to know why he had murdered Kelly. Taylor begs for mercy and tells them where to find one of his two accomplices, Paul Montgomery, but Darlene and Ellen kill him anyway, this time keeping him alive through being dragged across the pavement. They do the same to Montgomery, who tells them where to find the third killer, Jason Nelson, before he dies.
Meanwhile, the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) investigates the murders, theorizing that they were committed by two women with personal connections to the people their victims killed, and that they likely met through a grief support group. Technical Analyst Penelope Garcia finds the social network of such a support group in the area, on which Darlene and Ellen had repeatedly chatted about their desire to kill the people responsible for their losses, intensifying after Taylor was released from prison.
Darlene and Ellen break into Nelson's house, kidnap him, and get him to admit that he and his friends raped and murdered Kelly, and that he is a serial killer of young girls. Nelson bargains for his life by promising to take them to the place where he buried Kelly, while taunting Darlene about letting her daughter out alone for him to kill. He also tells Ellen that she enjoys killing as much as he does, and directs her to shoot a passing truck, severely injuring the driver, as Darlene looks on in horror.
When Nelson digs up the makeshift grave, he unearths only Kelly's skull; when Darlene demands to know where the rest of her is, he laughs and implies that he dismembered the corpse and buried the separate body parts in different places. Enraged, Darlene beats Nelson to death with the shovel. By the time the BAU gets to the crime scene, Darlene and Ellen are long gone.
They travel to Mexico, where Darlene and her husband had been planning to take Kelly on vacation the day she disappeared. Darlene and Ellen agree to split up to avoid being caught, and Darlene asks Ellen why they took their revenge so far. When Ellen tries to get her to admit she enjoyed killing their victims, Darlene replies that it had only made her feel emptier inside. Darlene then gets on a bus, and watches sadly as BAU Agent David Rossi, who had deduced where they were going after going through Darlene's personal effects, arrests Ellen.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- She is one of the only five criminals in Criminal Minds that remained at large in their final appearances, alongside Skull Tattoo Man, Shane Wyland, the Woodsman Killer and Taras Yudin.
External Links[]
- Darlene Beckett at the Criminal Minds Wiki
