# Lead Characters Who Commit Murder **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 15, 2011, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548 "2011-06-15T11:48:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/41 "2011-06-15T19:53:09Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > No one’s mentioned Leroy Jethro Gibbs yet? Geez, which one? Which murder, I mean. There’s only one Gibbs. Thank Athena. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/42 "2011-06-15T19:54:03Z")
[_Miller’s Crossing._](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%27s_crossing) (Of course, it’s a gangster-crime movie, no “good guys” as such.) ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/43 "2011-06-15T19:55:59Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > _Titus Andronicus, Othello_ – but those are official executions. _Richard III_ and _Macbeth,_ if slaying a foe in a fair fight counts. Not to mention _Hamlet_, where the “good guy” Prince Hamlet kills several “bad guys”, including Polonius and Claudius. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/44 "2011-06-15T19:57:51Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Yes, but O’Brian kept it from happening. > > Besides, the point of that scene wasn’t that Data had tried to kill Fajo; that killing would have been justified as an escape from a kidnapper. The point was that he lied to Riker’s face about it. Did he? ---
**Author:** ![TimeWinder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@TimeWinder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TimeWinder)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/45 "2011-06-15T19:59:55Z")
> [@The\_Peyote\_Coyote](#): > > She doesn’t do the deed herself, but at the end of _K is for Killer_, Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Milhone sets up a guy to be killed by the mob. Along the same lines, Michael Weston of _Burn Notice_ does this a lot in the first few seasons (not pulling the trigger, but ensuring someone will). And closer to the OP, at the end of a recent season (3?), he actually _does_ kill a bad guy in an abrupt and surprising ending (although he had at least two good reasons). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/46 "2011-06-15T20:01:16Z")
In one episode of _The Closer,_ Chief Brenda learns the suspect has committed murder only **after** he was granted immunity to testify about a different, related murder – an attempt on his own life as revenge for the first murder (which was of an old man at a candy store nobody in his 'hood ever touches, by general agreement, and of a child witness), which he blamed on a second homeboy, who then tried to murder him and got his twin brother and friends by mistake. Brenda, having finally got the goods to nail Homeboy 2, is entirely frustrated she has to release HB1, who is equally a murder and started the whole thing. But she does explain the situation to HB2 and then advises him he can make as many phone calls as she likes. She then drives HB1 home. And drops him off there. In the hood where every tough dude is suddenly glaring at him. And leaves. Chief Brenda pulls no trigger. But, knowingly leaving any person in an extemely dangerous situation really is the sort of thing for which a cop should get kicked off the force at the very least. Doing it with malice aforethought like that is probably a count of homicide. ---
**Author:** ![Truman\_Burbank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecc23a/32.png) [@Truman\_Burbank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Truman_Burbank)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/47 "2011-06-15T20:02:17Z")
I just watched Sarah shoot a guy in the coldest of blood. (I think I’m in Season 2 currently) ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/48 "2011-06-15T20:08:20Z")
There’s an early Spenser novel where Spenser feels like he’s out of options and sets up some bad guys with an ambush, where he takes them down from, IIRC, a sniper position. ---
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/49 "2011-06-15T20:12:27Z")
How about Kevin Costner pushing Frank Nitti off the roof in **The Untouchables**? ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/50 "2011-06-15T20:13:57Z")
Well, CSI’s current lead character, Dr. Ray Langston, committed murder. OTOH, his victim was a serial killer who’d stabbed and almost killed him months previous, and had just tortured Langston’s ex-wife with, among other things, dozens of fishhooks, so despite the fact that Langston had the guy cuffed, then let him go solely to beat and eventually kill him, YMMV on how “cold blooded” it was. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/51 "2011-06-15T20:17:21Z")
> [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > Major Game of Thrones spoiler ahead: > > Tyrion Lannister killing his father, Tywin. I don’t know if you consider Tyrion enough of a “good guy”, but the “you don’t have it in you” was definitely there. Would have been dandy if you put a “book, not the tv series (yet)” in there somewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/52 "2011-06-15T20:33:51Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > There’s an early Spenser novel where Spenser feels like he’s out of options and sets up some bad guys with an ambush, where he takes them down from, IIRC, a sniper position. It’s _Mortal Stakes_, though he’s using a shotgun; I don’t think that counts as being a sniper. He goes the shotgun route because he knows he’ll be the first suspect, as Quirk & Belson have just warned him that the two criminals in question are gunning for him. It’s made clear that Quirk believes Spenser killed them (he already knows what Spenser is capable of), but since the murders don’t take place in Boston proper, Quirk doesn’t feel obliged to investigate, though he does warn Spenser never to do it in Boston. That’s not Spenser’s last murder, though he doesn’t do it in Boston again. In _A Catskill Eagle_, he’s complicit in at least three cold-blooded killings, one of an unarmed man. ---
**Author:** ![Saltire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saltire/32/553_2.png) [@Saltire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saltire)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/53 "2011-06-15T20:53:44Z")
In Miami Vice, Don Johnson’s Sonny Crockett married a woman played by Sheena Easton, then a crimelord had her shot at one of her concerts. Sonny tracked the guy to some island without an extradition treaty, and killed him as he lounged by his pool. A second after the fool said Crockett would never do such a thing. In CSI: Miami, Horatio Caine married the sister of one of his techs, and she was killed. The two of them followed the killer to Brazil, where Horatio threatened the guy until the killer pulled a knife. Caine took it away from the guy and stabbed him to death with it. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/54 "2011-06-15T21:03:33Z")
_Of Mice and Men_, I guess not exactly a “Bad Guy” but still… ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/55 "2011-06-15T21:04:34Z")
Thanks, **Skald**. Your memory of it was much clearer than mine. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/56 "2011-06-15T21:11:34Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > Thanks, **Skald**. Your memory of it was much clearer than mine. 🙂 We just had a thread about it! Not to mention that I’ve been rereading them. ---
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/57 "2011-06-15T21:15:37Z")
In one of the Stephen Hunter books, Bob Lee Swagger figures out that the highly-placed Russian mole bad guy is now the head of the CIA that had helped him kill a Russian sniper from the old days who had tried to kill his family, and kills him and his henchmen with a claymore in the last scene. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/58 "2011-06-15T21:57:36Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > You obviously haven’t had your Lucas epiphany yet. Indeed I have and that epiphany was the realization that Lucas is a no-talent hack who has built his career on the work of others. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/59 "2011-06-15T22:02:18Z")
And again I’m surprised when I realize there’s been no mention of Jack Bauer in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548/60 "2011-06-15T22:10:48Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > And again I’m surprised when I realize there’s been no mention of Jack Bauer in this thread. He doesn’t commit cold blooded murder just at the end, he does it several times during every twenty-four hours. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lead-characters-who-commit-murder/585548.md?page=4)