| “ | Keep Estelle out of this! She's twenty-three years old! A mother! She deserves to live! | ” |
— Frank
| ||
Frank Cosgrove was a spree killer who appeared in the Season Ten episode of Criminal Minds, "Anonymous".
Background[]
Frank's daughter Estelle was once a drug addict, but she got over her addiction and later became a mother to a young boy named Timmy. The two moved back into his house so they could get back on their feet. However, Estelle became severely ill from cholestasis as a result of her addiction and was in need of a liver transplant. On July 2014, Frank attempted to donate part of his liver, but he was rejected because of his high blood pressure. When Estelle kept being delayed on the wait-list, Frank became even more desperate.
Anonymous[]
One night, while driving home, Frank comes across a woman named Betty Wright, who is critically wounded in a one-vehicle crash. He initially decides to take Betty to the hospital to be saved. However, when he reaches the hospital and notices that Betty is wearing a bracelet identifying her as an organ donor, he shoots her in the parking lot with the hope that her liver will be given to Estelle. He then leaves Betty to die under a tree. Two days later, Frank subdues a man named Cliff Daniels by bludgeoning him, then shoots him. He then leaves him on the doorstep of a church that has a sunrise service every morning, thinking that they will make sure he will get to the hospital in time for his organs to be preserved for donation. However, the sunrise service has been cancelled for that morning, and Cliff dies from his injuries. The next day, Frank targets Victor Hall outside the building where Victor's psychiatric therapist has an office. In order to make sure Victor will get to the hospital in time for his organs to be preserved for donation, Frank calls 911 to report his shooting. Then, he knocks Victor down and shoots him, carefully looking for a spot to shoot him so he will be alive when he gets to the hospital. However, the wounds inflicted on Victor are too serious and he dies at the scene.
Later that day, after hearing on the news that Victor is dead, Frank decides to target Dale Crawford, another organ donor. Frank breaks into Dale's house and calls 911 to report a shooting inside the home. He then notices that Dale has substance abuse problems and realizes he made a mistake in targeting him. When Dale wakes up and confronts him, Frank tells him that he "should've stayed asleep" and fatally shoots him in the head, then shoots at him five more times in the chest out of anger. Later that same day, Frank meets Estelle's friend Keith Doheny, who is higher on the wait-list than Estelle is. After Keith leaves the house, Frank follows him and kills him so Estelle can be moved higher up on the list. The following night, Frank comes home looking for Estelle, finds her on the floor unconscious, and takes her to the hospital. The next day, the hospital receives a liver of her blood type, but it goes to someone else at the last second, enraging Frank. Later, Frank is seen working his shift at the local DMV office when he comes across another organ donor, a woman named Carol Murray. Frank follows Carol outside and pulls out a gun on her, just as Morgan, JJ, and several police officers arrive. They order Frank to put the gun down, but he protests that Estelle does not deserve to die. After JJ convinces him that his actions aren't the solution, Frank apologizes to Carol, shoves her away, and fatally shoots himself in the head. As Frank had intended, his entire liver is donated to Estelle, though the BAU mention it was donated anonymously.
Modus Operandi[]
"911, please state your emergency."
"There's been a shooting."
"What is your location, sir?"
"Corner of Hazel [Street] and Parkway [Avenue]."
Frank initially targeted random people who were listed as organ donors. He came across his first victim, Betty Wright, by chance when he witnessed the car crash she was involved in, drove her to the hospital, and saw her medic alert bracelet that indicated she was an organ donor. Then, he targeted his later victims, all of whom he met at his workplace in the DMV, where he would see that they were organ donors on their information sheets. Frank subdued his initial victims by bludgeoning them with a tire iron (although the blows on his second victim, Cliff Daniels, were fatal), then shot them in the head with a snub-nosed revolver at a precise angle so he would graze the skull, but wouldn't damage the brain. He initially left his victims at places where they could be easily found and rescued, such as a church or a hospital. As he began to evolve, Frank would then call 911 to report the shootings prior to actually committing them. With Victor Hall, he used a disposable cellphone, which he then wiped his fingerprints off, while Dale Crawford's own home phone was used. Dale's was much sloppier than the others when he discovered that Dale was a substance abuser, which drove him to shoot Crawford repeatedly in a fit of rage. His last victim, Keith Doheny, was targeted and killed because he was ahead of Estelle on the wait-list for a liver transplant, with no 911 call being made prior to the shooting.
Profile[]
The unsub is a white male in his early to mid-50s who appears to be engineering murder scenarios. He is making sure the victims can be attended quickly enough to have their organs recovered since all of the victims were organ donors. In the case of the first victim Betty Wright, he saw her medic alert bracelet, which indicated she was an organ donor, but it is unknown as to how he learned about the other victims. He may need an organ for himself or a loved one, but because of the scarcity of available organs, he could be taking matters into his own hands; if the supply for organs is low, he will create the supply himself. With the fourth victim Dale Crawford, the unsub made a mistake since he did not know Dale was a drunkard and a drug addict, which would have compromised his vital organs and made him a poor candidate for a transplant. This resulted in the overkill present in Dale's murder. It is possible that this setback with Dale will actually accelerate the unsub's attacks and make him even more dangerous.
Known Victims[]
- 2015:
- January 20: Betty Wright (critically wounded by an unrelated car crash, then shot in the neck by Frank and left for dead at a hospital; slipped into a coma and later died in the hospital three days later as a result)
- January 22: Cliff Daniels (fatally bludgeoned with a tire iron, then shot in the head post-mortem; left for dead near a church)
- January 23:
- Victor Hall (bludgeoned with a tire iron, then fatally shot in the head; made a 911 call prior to the shooting)
- Dale Crawford (fatally shot once in the head and five times in the chest post-mortem; made a 911 call prior to the shooting like the previous victim)
- Keith Doheny (a member of Estelle's support group; shot in the upper body; didn't make a 911 call prior to the shooting)
- January 24: Carol Murray (held at gunpoint and attempted to kill; apparently didn't make a 911 call prior to the shooting)
Notes[]
- Frank appears to be inspired by John Quincy Archibald, the anti-hero of the 2002 film John Q. Archibald took hostages in a hospital when his son Michael needed a heart transplant and insurance wouldn't even cover the down payment, which later revealed Michael's ailment could've been found sooner if the parties responsible for identifying his risks didn't want to keep added profits.
- Frank is extremely similar to Clifford Walsh ("The Road Home") - Both were mission-oriented spree killers whose motivation involved a female relative of theirs in some way (Frank's daughter was suffering from cholestasis; Clifford's wife was killed in a home invasion), had wives that died prior to their sprees, came upon their first victims by chance, killed one of their victims differently than the rest (Frank killed his second victim by bludgeoning him; Clifford killed his third victim by running him over), committed overkill on at least one of the victims, and ended their sprees by fatally shooting themselves after holding a woman at gunpoint and attempting to kill them. Coincidentally, Frank's spree happened around the one-year anniversary of Clifford's spree. Also, on an unrelated note, the episodes they were featured in had a subplot that revolved around Rossi and Harrison Scott.