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| “ | Willing or not, Jake always has a mate. | „ |
| ~ McNare bragging about his killings. |
Frank McNare, also known as Body By Jake and BBJ, is the main antagonist of the Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode "Shibboleth". He is a serial killer who has murdered several women over 20 years, and who resurfaces after several years of inactivity. He is loosely based on Dennis Rader, a serial killer also known as the "BTK Killer".
He was portrayed by the late Kevin Conway, who also portrayed Conrad Straker in The Funhouse, Joseph Cardero in Homicide: Life on the Street, John Flynn in Law & Order, and King Leo in Black Knight.
Biography[]
Early life[]
From 1977 to 1982, McNare terrorized New York City by committing a series of sadistic murders, preying on young, attractive women. His signature was to tie up a victim's arms and one of her legs over her head with a blue and white rope so that she would choke to death if she relaxed her leg muscles. While he did not sexually assault his victims, he masturbated as he watched them struggle and, eventually, die. The media dubbed him "Body By Jake" or "BBJ" after he killed an aerobics instructor.
McNare stopped killing in 1982 after marrying his second wife, a masochist who willingly satisfied his needs. He got a job with New York City's Transit Authority, and spent his days watching female passengers on a security video feed and indulging in sadistic sexual fantasies about them. When his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, she could no longer fulfill his desires, so he began stalking women; when she died, he began killing again.
Keith Durbin, McNare's son by his first wife, found a picture of one of his father's victims, bound and gagged, in McNare's glove compartment when he was seven years old. The image was profoundly traumatic for Keith, and he re-enacted it by dressing his teddy bear in his mother's underwear and tying a blue string around its leg. Upon hitting puberty at 13, Keith discovered that he was sexually aroused by the image of a woman bound and gagged, and feared that he would become like his father, especially after McNare told him that he could not run away from being his "flesh and blood".
In "Shibboleth"[]
McNare murders a woman and calls 911 as she is choking so the operator can listen to her die. He then sends taunting letters to the police and the media demanding to be recognized. Detectives Robert Goren and Alexandra Eames of the NYPD's Major Case Squad realize that BBJ has begun killing again, and they try to provoke him into making a mistake by telling the press that he kills because he is sexually inadequate.
Sure enough, McNare's ego is so wounded that he attempts to kill a woman he has been stalking for weeks, but luckily she is held up at work and does not return home at her usual time. Enraged, McNare leaves her underwear and a noose on her floor, along with an angry poem declaring, "Willing or not, Jake always has a mate."
Goren and Eames' investigation leads them to the now-adult Keith, who had been arrested years earlier for binding and gagging his girlfriend in a sex game gone wrong. Keith, who has spent years repressing his sexual desires for fear of becoming a murderer, pleads innocence, but is nevertheless indicted for the BBJ murders because of circumstantial evidence connecting him to the victims. Goren has doubts, however, noting that Keith lacks the arrogance and aggression BBJ exhibits in his letters.
Goren and Eames look further into the case, theorizing that BBJ has most likely killed more women than the five victims he was given credit for. They uncover evidence linking the unidentified killer to an unsolved murder in 1977, as well as DNA that proves that the killer is related to Keith. They question McNare, who has not seen Keith since 1983, and Goren sees immediately that he is a cruel, egomaniacal bully, much like the BBJ of the letters. Goren takes DNA from McNare, which sends the killer into a panic until he learns that his son has been indicted.
Goren and Eames bring McNare in to their station house under the pretense of asking for information about Keith. McNare tries to implicate Keith in the murders, coldly dismissing his son as a "panty-waist" and a "pervert"; he even says that he doubts Keith is his biological son. Unbeknownst to him, Goren has brought Keith in to see what kind of person McNare really is, and tells him that he is nothing like his father. Keith breaks down and admits that he saw the photo of the murdered women in McNare's car, which gives Goren and Eames the proof they need to arrest McNare. As McNare is led away, he calls Keith "no son of mine", and Eames remarks that this was the nicest thing he could have said to Keith.
Trivia[]
- McNare is inspired by real-life serial killers Dennis Rader, a.k.a. "The BTK Killer", and Gary Ridgway, a.k.a. "The Green River Killer".
External Links[]
- Frank McNare on the Law & Order Wiki
