Ryan Phillips

"You don't know, do you... who I am? But I know who you are... Lindsey. And now you know who I am... and what I can do... what I will do... if you don't shut up!"

Ryan Phillips was the leader of a trio of thrill killers who appeared in Season Three of Criminal Minds.

Background
At an unspecified point, Ryan was kicked out of his Chula Vista, California high school after being caught using drugs on the premises, prompting him into becoming a petty criminal. Years after being expelled, Ryan met and befriended two high school seniors named Douglas Silverman and Taylor Coleman, his future partners-in-crime.

3rd Life
Early in 2008 during a holiday weekend, Ryan, Doug, and Taylor approached a girl named Katie Owens (who had a crush on Ryan) outside a theatre and offered her a ride, which she accepted, with her friend, Lindsey Vaughan, (who believed Ryan was trouble) tagging along. Taking the girls to an abandoned house on the outskirts of town, Ryan and his friends sadistically tortured Katie for hours, with the torture culminating in Ryan strangling her to death with a belt. Katie's death caused Doug to panic and want out; when he tried to escape, Ryan stabbed him several times with a knife. Not knowing his attack on Doug was fatal (the boy having managed to run some distance and hide before finally succumbing to his injuries), Ryan believed he was going to the police, dumped Katie's body in a nearby construction site (destroying her face and hands to delay the identification process), and took Lindsey to the closed Mayford High School.

Trying to think of what to do next, Ryan decided to keep Lindsey alive for use as a bargaining chip and sent Taylor home to get his father's gun. When Taylor fails to return after some time (having been hospitalized by Lindsey's father, Jack, a former hitman who had discovered the identity of his daughter's abductors), Ryan begins advancing on Lindsey, intent on raping her, when he is bashed with a shotgun by the recently arrived Jack. Lying on the floor, Ryan begs for his life while Lindsey begins yelling at her father to kill her captor for what he did to Katie. Arriving at the scene, Reid begins trying to talk Jack down, stating "Jack, your life has been about violence, and, if you do this, Lindsey's will be, too. Do you want that? When does it end, Jack?" After listening to the agent, Jack simply says "tomorrow" before blowing Ryan's head off. Due to being in the Witness Protection Program when he killed Ryan, Jack is able to get away with murdering Ryan. Ryan being killed in front of him also had an adverse of affect on Reid, causing his cravings for dilaudid to return over time.

Profile
The BAU's profile of the dominant member of the unsubs stated he would be somewhere in his twenties, have a flagrant disregard for the rules, and a defiant attitude towards figures of authority. As such, the unsub likely flunked out of or was expelled from school and had a record of petty crimes, such as theft. The girls being taken from a well lit, alley-less, and crowded area also implicated they were acquainted with their abductor and went with him willingly.

Modus Operandi
Ryan killed Katie by strangling her with a belt (torturing her for hours via beating and cutting beforehand) and killed Doug by stabbing him several times. In an attempt to delay the police's investigation, Ryan mangled Katie's hands and face post-mortem to make her harder to identify and connect to him. It is also safe to speculate that he, along with Coleman and Silverman, raped Katie as well, as he later tried to rape Lindsey, and may have done so beforehand as well. Phillips also tied Lindsey up and held her captive in the school washroom, with Coleman's help.

Known Victims

 * Katie Owens
 * "Lindsey" Vaughan
 * Douglas Silverman

Appearances

 * Season Three
 * "3rd Life"
 * "Elephant's Memory"