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| “ | I'm going to be a legend. That'll show her. | „ |
| ~ Becker cursing his mother. |
Humphrey Becker is the main antagonist of the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Scavenger". He is a serial killer who murders women in the same manner as the notorious unidentified serial killer RDK in order to become famous.
He is portrayed by Doug Hutchison, who also portrayed Percy Wetmore in The Green Mile, Pete Willard in A Time to Kill, Eugene Tooms in The X-Files, and James Russoti in Punisher: War Zone.
Early life[]
Becker was raised by his selfish, domineering mother, Ida, after his father walked out on the family. Ida named Becker after her favorite movie star, Humphrey Bogart, and would frequently leave him in the locked closet of their apartment with the lights turned off so she could go to watch his movies in the theater. The trauma of her neglect, combined with her constant badgering and verbal abuse, led him to develop both a crippling fear of the dark and a violent hatred of women.
As a young man, he studied journalism in college, but he was kicked out of school after he was caught plagiarizing his senior thesis. He nevertheless managed to get a job as a researcher for the Manhattan Sun. It turned out to be a dead-end job, however; he spent the next 20 years in the newspaper's basement archiving old issues and treated like he didn't exist by his superiors.
He wrote several books on his own time, mostly in the true crime genre, but every one of them was rejected by every major publisher, fueling his obsessive rage; he even papered the walls of his apartment with rejection letters. When his latest book, about the notorious unidentified serial killer known as "RDK" ("Rape, Dismember, Kill"), is rejected by a publisher that only accepts submissions about current crimes, Becker gets an idea: to commit murders using the exact M.O. and signature of R.D.K. during the 25th anniversary of his last known murder so the public will think that he has resurfaced, all so he can get his books published and, at long last, become famous.
In "Scavenger"[]
Becker sets his plan in motion by stealing a Sun reporter's press credentials and interviewing RDK's only surviving victim, Jeannette Henley, and veteran crime reporter Morty Graf, who had covered RDK's initial murders, to learn about RDK's signature and M.O. He then kidnaps Julie Liebert and murders her in the same way RDK killed his victims - except for the rape, which he is too sexually inadequate to perform - and leaves her nude corpse hanging in her apartment. He then leaves a taunting note - signed "Rupert Daniel Kilmore" - on her infant son's stroller and leaves it in Central Park, with the child inside.
Joggers find the child and call the NYPD's Special Victims Unit. Detectives Olivia Benson and Olivia Benson investigate and find the real Kilmore, a watchmaker who had nothing to do with the crime, but Becker calls him anonymously and tells him to give the detectives a fax that has just been sent to Kilmore's shop. The fax contains another clue, this one leading them to a homeless drug addict whom Becker paid to send the fax, but who is too high to remember who paid him.
While Benson, Stabler, and Captain Donald Cragen try to decipher the message, they receive an envelope vis courier that contains Liebert's ear. With help from Sergeant John Munch, they crack the code, which directs them to a nearby warehouse, where they find Henley's body and another riddle indicating that RDK has kidnapped another woman. However, by the time Benson and Stabler find the woman, Gloria Durham, she is already dead, covered with roses and with symbols drawn on her feet; they also find a copy of that day's newspaper with a note from the killer expressing frustration with the lack of press coverage of his "return".
Benson and Stabler talk to Henley, who mentions speaking with a reporter from the Sun several days earlier. Benson and Stabler go the Sun's offices, only to find that the reporter in question never spoke with Henley. From Henley's description of the man she spoke with, as repeated by Benson and Stabler, the newspaper's editor directs them to Becker, but he is supposedly on vacation. Munch, meanwhile, talk to Graf, who says that Becker talked his way into getting a locker at an exclusive reporter's club. Assistant District Attorney Casey Novak gets a search warrant for Becker's locker, in which Munch finds two pairs of earrings belonging to the victims.
Benson and Stabler search Becker's apartment and find a diary in which he has written that, on that very night, he plans to kill a single mother of a young boy who works as a showgirl. After getting the would-be victim and her child to safety, Benson gets a phone call from Cragen informing her that Henley is missing. Benson returns to Henley's apartment, where she finds Becker in Henley's bed, waiting for her. She arrests Becker, who says that he buried Henley alive with an oxygen tank that will last for 15 hours.
Stabler interrogates him and at one point puts him a chokehold, but Becker refuses to divulge where he buried Henley, instead ranting that the murders will win him the fame and prestige he has feels has been unfairly denied him. Cragen and forensic psychiatrist George Huang pull Stabler off of Becker and kick him out of the interrogation room, leaving Huang to examine Becker. Huang theorizes that Becker spares his victims' children because he identifies with them, and that he feels this way because his own mother abused him - a suggestion that noticeably upsets Becker. Huang deduces further that Becker did not rape his victims, as the RDK did his, because doing so would have made him feel like he was having sex with his mother, which sends Becker into a fury. Huang then tells Benson and Stabler that finding Becker's mother may be the key to finding Henley.
Benson and Stabler track down Ida and have her come to the precinct and talk to her son, whom she has not seen or spoken to in 25 years. Becker is visibly unnerved by her presence, especially when she brings up locking him in the closet when he was a child. Benson and Stabler realize that Becker is claustrophobic and afraid of the dark, so they lock him in a storage closet and turn off the light and tell him they will not let him out until he tells them where he buried Henley. Terrified, Becker gives them the location, and they find her just in time to save her. Becker, meanwhile, is found guilty of murder and kidnapping and imprisoned for life.
Trivia[]
- The "RDK" acronym is based on the "BTK" acronym used by Dennis Rader, whose case was unsolved at the time.
External links[]
- Humphrey Becker on the Law & Order Wiki
