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| “ | This is your fault! | „ |
| ~ Tidwell as he murders the fathers of the families he targets. |
Jerry Tidwell is the main antagonist of the Criminal Minds episode "Beyond Borders". He is a serial killer who murders entire families who remind him of his own abusive parents.
He was portrayed by Darri Ingolfsson, who also portrayed Oliver Saxon in Dexter, as an adult, and by Dylan Garza as a child.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Tidwell was born into an abusive Dutch-American family in which his father beat him mercilessly and locked him in closets for the slightest failure, real or imagined. In 2004, Tidwell killed his father, stepmother, and two half-siblings in a fit of rage during a family vacation in Florida, and was put in a juvenile facility for six years. After his release, Tidwell worked for his uncle Jonathan, a fisherman, who left him the business after his death in 2013. He got a second job as a shuttle driver to supplement his income.
Tidwell resented his family for the abuse he suffered as a child, and so began abducting entire families, using his second job as an airport shuttle driver to pick them up and put them in his power. His first victims were the Everett family in Aruba, followed in 2014 by the Isaacs family in Florida.
"Beyond Borders"[]
Tidwell next targets the Sullivan family, parents Greg and Colleen, and children Allison and Nick, who are on vacation in Barbados. He drugs them and holds them prisoner on his fishing boat, re-enacting the abuse his father put his family through by beating and cursing Greg. All the while, he has flashbacks of his traumatic childhood, which make him angrier and more violent. The following day, Tidwell takes Nick fishing on the boat, berating him for every mistake, just as his father had done to him.
He then makes the entire family sit down to dinner with him, and orders Greg to blow out a "birthday candle" on a cupcake. When Allison starts crying, Tidwell flies into a rage and attacks her, provoking Greg to come to her defense. During the ensuing fight, Greg briefly subdues Tidwell, giving him enough time to breaks loose of his restraints and free his family. They run for a lifeboat, but Tidwell catches them before they can escape and ties them up once again.
Meanwhile, the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) investigate the kidnapping with help from the Bureau's International Response Team (IRT). They profile the kidnapper as a young, white male who works as a shuttle driver and who murders families he sees as surrogates for his own. From the torture he inflicts upon the fathers, they deduce that he was abused as a child by his own father, while he kills the other family members because he resents his mother and siblings for failing to protect him. From the salt water in his victims' lungs, they deduce that he is holding them captive on a boat. Finally, they theorize that he is from the Netherlands, as he has been seen on security videos wearing orange and blue, the colors of that country's national flag. BAU Technical Analyst Penelope Garcia looks for suspects with these characteristics, and eventually finds Tidwell.
Tidwell finally decides to kill the Sullivans, first throwing Nick overboard. Allison breaks free once again and tries to stab Tidwell with a screwdriver, but he overpowers her and prepares to kill her in front of Greg and Colleen, Just then, however, the BAU and IRT arrive to arrest Tidwell, who panics and holds Allison at gunpoint. He opens fire on BAU Agent Jennifer Jareau and IRT Chief Jack Garrett, as well as an overseeing helicopter flown by BAU Supervisory Agent Aaron Hotchner and IRT Agent Lily Lambert. Jareau yells for Allison to duck, giving Garrett the chance to shoot Tidwell dead.
Trivia[]
- Tidwell is inspired by multiple real-life criminals:
- Oba Chandler, a serial killer/rapist convixted and executed for raping a mother and two daughters in Florida, weighing them into the sea to drown them.
- Joran van der Sloot, a Dutch murderer and the prime suspect in the disappearance of Natalee Holloway in Aruba, who was later convicted in Peru for murdering a college student there.
- Joseph Kallinger, an American serial killer with a history of horrific violence and family abuse in his childhood, which turned him to torturing other families, including his own.
- Nathaniel Code, a.k.a. "The Cedar Grove Killer", a serial killer of families motivated by desires for control from violence, which included drowning in sinks.
- Ronald DeFeo, Jr., an American murderer of his family out of a hateful relationship with his father.
External Links[]
- Jerry Tidwell on the Criminal Minds Wiki
