Frank Breitkopf

Frank Breitkopf was a prolific serial killer and abductor who appeared in Season Two of Criminal Minds.

Background
Frank was born the son of one Mary Louise Breitkopf, a German immigrant, and never knew his father. They lived together in an apartment in Manhattan. He was highly intelligent and for that reason, had a number of specific needs. In order to be able to afford to care for her son's needs, Mary Louise resorted to prostitution, occasionally in her own home, at which point her son witnessed the encounters. As a result, Frank grew up to become a textbook sexual sadist; when his mother died (possibly at Frank's hands), he left home, traveling around the U.S. with his trailer and killing people, funding himself with the possessions and money taken from his victims. In 1977, while he was in Golconda, Nevada, he met a young woman named Jane and attempted to kill her. However, when she was on his makeshift autopsy table, she looked straight into his eyes and felt calm, which completely turned him off. He would later claim that he fell in love with her and regularly returned to Golconda to leave her wind chimes made out of rib bones taken from some of his victims. Whenever he stopped by, he would also have a strawberry milkshake at a local diner. The BAU is summoned to investigate him when several of his latest murders are connected.

No Way Out
By the time the BAU investigated, Frank abducts Sheriff Georgia Davis when she is assigned to watch Jane, whose connection had been traced to Frank. He then goes to a remote diner, where he is recognized. This leads to Gideon and Morgan entering the diner to meet him and find the location of Sheriff Davis. Frank is interested in Gideon's name and explains to him what it means in mythological and biblical terms. When the two agents identify themselves and demand to know where Davis is, Frank calmly replies that he is going to finish his milkshake and leave. Gideon then asks Frank if he would like to know how they caught him, just as police cars surround the diner. After Gideon says that a woman's suicide would have no emotional effect on Frank, Davis's husband Mark bursts into the diner and threatens Frank with a double-barreled shotgun if he doesn't tell him where he has his wife. Frank eventually issues an ultimatum after handing a bag containing a man's decapitated head to Gideon.

Frank is led outside of the diner by Morgan and Gideon and are met by the local authorities, including Sheriff Davis, who had been found inside a trailer Frank used to kill his victims. She is traumatized, having witnessed Frank brutally murder a local. Frank then tells Gideon that if he is allowed to get away with Jane, he will reveal the location of a busload of children he has abducted (explaining the decapitated head; the victim was a school bus driver). Gideon is skeptical, but eventually believes that Frank would not actually harm children. Gideon drives the two of them to the desert and watches as Frank and Jane share a disturbing kiss. By the time Gideon drops him and Jane off, Frank tells him that the children are two miles to the west. Gideon allows them to leave, locates the children, all unharmed, and calls for support. They follow Frank and Jane's footprints into the desert, where they disappeared. Gideon declares, "We'll find him."

No Way Out II


Frank reappears in the season finale at McLean, Virginia, where Gideon lives. Having accidentally lost Jane sometime ago, Frank decides to attract Gideon's attention, killing Gideon's girlfriend Sarah in Gideon's own apartment before calling him, saying, "What is your fascination with birds?" Before leaving Sarah's body behind at the scene, he cuts off one of her ribs and places it in her hand to tell the BAU that he has lost Jane and wants her back. Frank then murders Rebecca Bryant, the daughter and former hostage of budding serial killer Randall Garner and also abducts Tracy Belle, the would-be victim of young serial killer Jeffrey Charles. Gideon learns that Frank is now intent on killing all of the would-be victims that were rescued by him. When Gideon finally locates and confronts Frank in Manhattan, Jane appears and intervenes. Frank then grabs Jane's wrists, tells her that he loves her, and the two jump onto the nearby train tracks. A passing train instantly kills them. Tracy is rescued, but the events psychologically scarred Gideon, eventually leading to his resignation from the BAU next season.

Profile
"Were you afraid? I've never felt the feeling of fear. Apparently I'm... incapable. Tell me, Rebecca. What does it feel like? Fear?"

The unsub is a white male aged in his mid- to late-50s, listens to Beethoven, wears a corduroy jacket with a fleece-lined collar, and is left-handed. In a right pocket inside his jacket would be a notebook containing extensive details of the torture of every one of his victims. It is essential that he sees the terror in his victims' eyes, as it is what gives him release. He either has medical training or has honed that skill over the years. He is also methodically and obsessively clean. His vehicle is most likely a mute-colored RV, neither old nor new and in perfect condition. It will have a radio, radar detectors, and a police-band radio, allowing him to evade authorities. His vehicle is also his killing room, and it will be soundproofed, have surgical instruments on the walls, and a stirrup chair or an autopsy table in it. All of his murders are recorded, if not on a camera then in a journal. He is also a textbook psychopath exhibiting all of the classic traits: incapability of feeling any empathy towards others, neither guilt or remorse, and claiming no responsibility for his actions. Like others of his type, he is highly intelligent, manipulative, and narcissistic. It is later discovered that he always travels east to west along the same highway (Interstate 80), and all of his victims were abducted and killed along his route.

Modus Operandi
Targeting random people who were unwanted in society, such as gang members and runaways, Frank used ketamine on his victims to paralyze them, take them to his trailer, and place them on a metal table situated underneath a mirror (meant to allow the victims to watch what he was doing to them). He would then vivisect them and remove their organs with surgical tools. He would also dismember the victims while they were still aware and cauterize the wounds by burning them with some sort of tool in order to keep them alive for a longer period of time. After watching the victims die, Frank would typically remove a single right rib bone, which he would use to make wind chimes for Jane. He would then dump the remains in remote areas near Interstate 80, although the bodies of his later victims were left where they were killed. In the case of Sarah Jacobs, she was targeted because of her relationship with Gideon and left her severed rib bone in her hand. He also targeted Rebecca Bryant and Tracy Belle for being survivors of unsubs apprehended by the BAU.

Real-Life Comparison
In the Season Two Making-Of documentary, Simon Mirren states that the inspiration for Frank came from the story of an unnamed man who had created a makeshift torture chamber complete with torture instruments, video cameras, and a gynecology chair. Both serial killer Robert Ben Rhoades and suspected serial killer David Parker Ray tortured their victims in trailers equipped to act as torture chambers, although neither are officially identified as Frank's inspiration. Frank's method of dissecting his victims to prolong their pain also seems to be similar to the M.O. of uncaught serial killer Jack the Ripper.

Frank seems to be based from serial killer Ted Bundy. Both were prolific, psychopathic, and organized serial killers who committed murders over a span of decades in multiple states with the possibility of many more victims and cases that were unsolved. Both were also sadists who took pleasure in seeing their victims' fear moments before death, mutilated them, and kept trophies of their murders as to relive them; Frank kept the victims' rib bones while Bundy kept their skulls. After being captured, Bundy attracted a following of female fans, seemingly echoing Jane's captivation towards Frank. In addition, both Bundy and Frank evaded capture once from the authorities after being held in their custody. Lastly, both presented themselves as good-looking, charming, and non-threatening due to their physical appearance and way of dressing, which allowed them evade suspicion.

Frank's M.O. also mirrors the Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run in several ways. Frank's victims did not fall within an established profile and were chosen randomly (as the unidentified Butcher is speculated to have done), were dismembered (although Frank did it ante-mortem while the Butcher did it post-mortem), and (in many cases) only partial remains of them were found long after decomposition.

Frank's mother being a prostitute seems to mirror that of Henry Lee Lucas' background.

Quotes
Frank: What's your name? Come on, names are a hobby of mine.

Gideon: Jason Gideon.

Frank: Jason. From Greek mythology, to heal. Gideon, a hero from the Old Testament who lead the Israelites against the Midianites. Your parents had great expectations of you. I'm Frank. Germanic, third century, derived from the name of a kind of spear. I wonder what expectations my parents had of me.

Frank: (to Morgan) If I had your looks, do you know how much easier my life would be?

Frank: (to Gideon, smiling) What's the psychopath got in the bag, Jason?

Frank: Magic time!

Gideon: If I ever find myself feeling what you feel, I'll kill myself.

Frank: Call me first, I'd love to pick your brains.

Frank: (while on the phone with Gideon) What is your fascination with birds, Jason?

Gideon: Who is this?

Frank: (ignoring Gideon) Paintings of birds, sketches of birds, books about birds...

Gideon: Frank, please, please don't hurt her.

Frank: Birds can be extremely single-minded in their pursuits. Almost... obsessed.

Frank: (to Rebecca) Did you know recent studies into female rape victims found a high proportion of them, later in life, are raped again?

Rebecca: No, I wasn't raped.

Frank: (ignoring Rebecca) It's almost as if, in them, they had a kind of... signal.

Frank: (to the BAU via phone) I regret to inform you that Rebecca's name should be moved to a new list.

Frank: (to the phone, in a calling voice) Jason...

Gideon: You son of a bitch. I swear to you, I will find you, and I will stop you.

Frank: Shhhh, Jason. I chose the station because I know how much you love trains. I saw the toys in your apartment.

(Frank hangs up)

Hotch: Frank.

Frank: Agent Hotchner! We haven't had the pleasure of a... formal meeting.

Hotch: Where is Tracy Belle?

Frank: Do you have something for me?

(Hotch hesitates for a moment)

Hotch: No I don't.

Frank: (calmly, facing away from Hotch) Then you'll never see her again.

Frank: (to Jane) I love you.

Jane: I love you too.

(The two jump on the railroad tracks in spite of Gideon's protests and are killed by a passing train)

Appearances

 * Season Two
 * No Way Out
 * No Way Out II: The Evilution of Frank
 * Season Three
 * Doubt
 * In Name and Blood
 * Lo-Fi
 * Season Four
 * Omnivore
 * Season Six
 * Compromising Positions
 * Supply and Demand
 * Season Eight
 * Carbon Copy
 * Brothers Hotchner
 * Season Ten
 * Nelson's Sparrow