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| “ | I belong on death row for what I did. I caused a lot of people to be hurt...and families destroyed. | „ |
| ~ Veronica's confession |
Veronica Day is the main antagonist of the Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior episode “The Time is Now. Veronica is a family murder facilitator who was on retrial and at risk of being released in spite of her crimes, which revealed there was more to her case than just her guilt.
She’s portrayed by Mariana Klaveno.
Biography[]
Veronica’s mother Jennifer Conroy left Veronica to the foster system. Veronica ran away at age 14 and stayed homeless for years, until she found Jennifer in Sacramento, working as a waitress at a diner. Veronica wanted to get close to Jennifer and eventually tell her the truth, so she lied about her age and found employment at the same eatery as a dishwasher. In 1996, a dark-haired murderer took it all away from Veronica and Jennifer when the killer shot Jennifer in her head with a shotgun, killing her instantly. Veronica found her mother dead and was irreparably traumatized and scarred with grief. In 2001, Veronica snapped for unknown reasons and ordered three different teenage boys to kill their parents in their beds with shotgun blasts, “The Time is Now” painted on the walls in each parents’ blood at each scene. Rachel Lidge, the sister of the last boy Veronica manipulated, saw Veronica with her brother Peter, reporting the both of them to the police to be arrested. As none of the boys would turn on Veronica, she was instead tried for Jennifer’s murder. Instead of a scarred, self-hating orphan who wanted to punish families she projected on and disapproved of, FBI director Jack Fickler, when he was a profiler on the case, argued Veronica was a narcissistic psychopath who played God with the lives of full house families. When a witness came forward saying they saw Jennifer’s real killer, prosecutor Gordon Ramirez smothered the account and kept it out of court. Veronica was convicted of Jennifer’s murder and sentenced to death.
In 2011, Veronica filed a motion for a mistrial, arguing Fickler’s inaccurate profile swayed the jury. When attending the trial again, Fickler solicited the expertise of Agent Sam Cooper to question and profile Veronica during the retrial, Veronica simply sitting quietly and staring off without emotion during the proceedings. Agent Cooper spoke with Veronica and asked her about the trial and herself, and she says she can read into people’s personalities with an acuity most people can’t. But when Cooper mentions Veronica’s mother, she snaps, gets emotional, and then starts shrieking at Cooper to leave while throwing her spare change of clothes at her. Cooper holds the guards back, knowing she’s overcome and not violent, realizing Fickler’s profile was wrong after all because she loves her deceased mother and can’t handle the grief. When Ramirez’s evidence suppression is discovered, Veronica is acquitted, and she publicly thanks the FBI for their efforts. They’re afraid she’ll pose a threat to Rachel since she’s a witness, and she indeed goes to Rachel’s house to ask if Rachel remembers Veronica. Veronica instead surprises everybody by earnestly apologizing for destroying Rachel’s family and confessing to all her crimes. She surrenders to arrest when law enforcement arrives, and behind bars again, she voices her regrets to Cooper after finally accepting all the pain and trauma she caused. Cooper promises his own courtesy of doing his best to look for Jennifer’s killer, and Veronica is touched by the gesture enough to thank him. She finally accepts her incarceration for arranging the three families’ murders.
Trivia[]
- Veronica's case is inspired by multiple real-life criminals:
- Catherine Suh, the suspected murderer of her mother, eventually convicted of manipulating her brother, Andrew, into shooting Catherine's boyfriend.
- The Menendez brothers case, where Erik and Lyle Menendez killed their parents with a shotgun and argued abuse, which failed as a defense to keep them from imprisonment.
- Mike Nifong, a prosecutor congictsd of prosecutorial miscondict from withholding evidence in the infamous Duke Lacrosse case.
