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| “ | You just have to let go. | „ |
| ~ Peter's signature line to his victims. |
Peter Redding is the main antagonist of the Criminal Minds episode "A Higher Power". He is an "Angel of Death"-type serial killer who murders people who are in physical or emotional pain, and makes their deaths look like suicides.
He is portrayed by Scott Michael Campbell.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
Peter is the oldest of college professor Charles Redding's two sons. Charles molested James throughout his entire childhood, and Peter watched helplessly as his brother suffered severe depression as a result of their father's abuse. Finally, when Peter was 15, he could not stand to see James suffer anymore, and killed him by slashing his wrists, believing he was putting James out of his misery. James' death was considered a suicide.
As an adult, Peter became an "Angel of Death"-type serial killer, murdering people who were in physical or emotional pain whom he thought were better off dead. When 14 children were killed in a fire in Peter's hometown, he attended support group meetings for the grieving parents and befriended each of them, gaining their trust and sympathy with the story of his brother's "suicide". He would then knock them unconscious with a paralytic agent and kill them in a way that mimicked suicide, such as cutting their wrists or overdosing them on prescription medication.
In "A Higher Power"[]
Paul Baleman, the brother of Peter's latest victim, contacts the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit because he suspects that his brother's death was not a suicide. The BAU agents tie the suspicious death to four others in the area that were ruled as suicides.
After discovering a link between the murders and the fire, the BAU theorize that the killer is targeting people who lost loved ones in the tragedy because he believes he is ending their pain. They monitor Laurie Ann Morris, whose child was killed in the fire, and witness Peter kidnap her and drive her away. Peter tries to persuade her that he is trying to end her suffering, but Laurie Ann, who wants to live for her surviving children, seizes the steering wheel and crashes the car, non-fatally, into a dumpster. As the BAU arrests him, Peter insists that he has done nothing wrong.
The BAU agents find Peter's journal, in which he had written detailed accounts of all his murders, but find no evidence that he had killed Baleman. They ultimately learn that, ironically, Baleman's death, which had sent them onto Peter's trail, had been a genuine suicide.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Peter is inspired by Charles Cullen, a serial killer of hospital patients wherever he worked as a nurse, poisoning them when he believed they'd keep their "dignity" when they died.
External Links[]
- Peter Redding at the Criminal Minds Wiki
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