Trey Gordon

"I did it again. It's not supposed to happen. Please. I need help. Can you help me?!"

Trey Gordon, dubbed "The Day/Night Killer" by the media, is a sleepwalking serial-turned-spree killer who was briefly mistaken for two serial killers. He appeared in In the Dark.

Background
Trey's mother died at some point early in his life, and he was left to be raised by his abusive father Samuel. Samuel was a poacher with a criminal record consisting of arrests for drug use and solicitation. He liked to bring Trey to drug dens and prostitution brothels that he would frequent. In the early morning hours of May 14, 1991, police raided a brothel and found the then-eight-year-old Trey in a bedroom with a naked prostitute who had molested him. Samuel was busy having sex with another prostitute in the next room. It is unclear whether Samuel or the naked prostitute involved were prosecuted as a result.

As an adult, Trey started taking multiple prescribed medications for anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and borderline personality disorder, all preconditions for sleepwalking. On February 7, 2017, Samuel died of a heart attack, prompting Trey to start killing men who reminded him of his father, starting in February or the beginning of March. However, unconsciously, that was not enough for him; as he succumbed to sleepwalking, he started tracking down the places Samuel frequented, which had now been renovated into up-and-coming suburban homes. There, he would kill any homeowners present.

In the Dark
After claiming four lives in about six weeks, Trey targets Bob Joplin while he is in the woods hunting for deer. As Bob targets a deer and is about to shoot it, Trey kills Bob with the rifle from a distance. Afterwards, he packs up all of his gear and leaves the woods. The following night, Trey goes to the residence of Mike Hood. There, he lures Mike to the front door with a noise. Mike steps outside the door with a bat for intruders and arms himself. No one is on the front porch and when Mike goes back inside, Trey appears in front of him and kills him. The following evening, Trey goes to the residence of Jon Kreutzmann and Lyn Anastasio. As they both watch a horror movie, Trey knocks on the door and Jon answers it. When he opens the door, Trey kills him. After killing Jon, Trey pursues Lyn as she tries to escape through the back door, but she is unable and Trey kills her as well. The following morning, Trey gets up from the bed and notices a cut on the sole of his foot from a glass that he stepped on when Lyn dropped it on the floor as she tried to escape from him. He treats the cut, takes out his prescription medication and swallows it with water. Afterwards, Trey lays down on his bed and has a dream of him beating up his father, who then grabs Trey by the neck.

The following night, Trey picks a knife from a case of knives and goes to the residence of Paul McConnell. When Paul answers the door, Trey non-fatally stabs him. Then, Paul grabs his shotgun and tries to shoot Trey, but he grabs him and the gun goes off. Afterwards, while Paul loads his shotgun, he yells at Trey to get out of the house. Trey starts to flee out of the house through the back door as Paul pursues him. Paul looks outside to see where Trey is, but he doesn't see him because of the darkness. The next day, Trey returns to his residence and notices blood on his shirt. He takes off his bloodied shirt, takes out his bloodied clothes from the garbage and puts them in the furnace where he lights a match and burns them. Trey is next seen taking a shower. While doing so, he has a flashback to when his father demanded him to open the door. Afterwards, Trey makes himself a coffee when he sees on television the news of his killings, which shocks him. Then, he takes out all of his prescription medication and calls Doctor Paige. He demands to speak to his doctor, but the caller tells him that Doctor Paige is not available and hangs up on him, which causes him to have a psychotic break. Afterwards, Trey puts all of the knives in a bag and rifle in the cabinets and locks them in, and then he locks the door in an attempt to lock himself in. Later, Trey takes a sip of his coffee and slaps himself in the face to stay awake.

The following night, Trey goes to the residence of Janis Weir, with the intention of killing her. However, Janis gets a call from Prentiss, who warns her about Trey arriving to her residence to kill her. But while doing so, Trey arrives at the house and breaks down the door. Janis yells that Trey is in the house, so she runs into the bathroom and locks herself in. Trey breaks down the door with the knife and while doing so, he hallucinates his father's image onto the door that he is stabbing him. Then, the BAU show up and hold him at gunpoint. Rossi orders Trey to drop the knife. He tries to approach Rossi and kill him, but Stephen shoots at the chair to wake him up. He looks at the knife, drops it and becomes shocked. They ask him if he knows where he is and Trey looks around and says this is where he was, but stops midway in the sentence. Then, Trey realizes that he sleepwalked again and it is not supposed to happen. He begs them that he needs help and asks the BAU to help him, to which Stephen replies that they will try. Afterwards, Trey is handcuffed by Alvez, who tells him that he is under arrest for the murder of eight people, which shocks him even more. Trey is last seen being taken away on a medical stretcher and is most likely institutionalized afterwards.

Modus Operandi
Trey had two distinct M.O.s, which caused the BAU to initially believe two different, independent unsubs were at work. As such, they dubbed one series of murders as the work of "The Woods Unsub", and the other as the work of "The Home Invasion Unsub". Trey's signature, the only thing in common between both sets of murders, was killing all of his victims with a single gunshot or stab wound directed to the heart.


 * As the Woods Unsub, Trey would kill male poachers with a history of violent confrontations, who all reminded him of his father, during the daytime hours. He would follow them into the woods, position himself at a safe distance, and kill them by shooting them once with a scoped Winchester .30-06-caliber, single-action hunting rifle. He was always organized during these killings and made sure he never left behind any incriminating evidence since he never sleepwalked during those murders.
 * As the Home Invasion Unsub, Trey, while sleepwalking, would break into a home in the middle of the night and stab the homeowner(s) to death with a hunting knife, believing he was stabbing his father instead. All of the homes he targeted were former drug dens or prostitution brothels that his father frequented. The first victims, all women, suffered from multiple stab wounds, but as he devolved, the victims suffered from only one stab wound. During these killings, he was disorganized and more violent, which would increase as he went along due to the heightening seriousness of his sleepwalking.

Profile
The unsub is a sleepwalking serial killer aged in his 20s. His sleepwalking diagnosis is based on his surprisingly strong ability to ignore pain inflicted on him during the latest murders; this, plus the fact that this happened at night, can only be explained by conditions such as neuropathy or sleepwalking. Because he still has great aim, neuropathy of the limbs can be ruled out. Additional contributing factors like depression, addiction, or obsessive-compulsive disorder could be keeping his brain from reaching full REM sleep. Due to these sleepwalking episodes, he will wake up more tired than he went to bed. These nighttime murders are his way of looking for some kind of release that he is not getting whenever he kills while awake. He is able to control his rage when he is awake, thus explaining the organized and calculated murders in the woods. That self-control turns off once he falls asleep, however, thus leading to the messy and chaotic home invasion murders.

Real-Life Comparison
Trey has some similarities to the prolific South African serial killer Cedric Maake and may have been indirectly based from him. Maake had three different M.O.s that he used simultaneously: bludgeoning passers-by at a beach with a rock; ambushing couples in cars, shooting the man before raping the woman; and killing tailors in their shops with a hammer. While the first two series of murders were soon identified as the work of a single killer, the third one was believed to be a different case almost until Maake's arrest, much like how Trey was initially assumed to be two independent serial killers.

Known Victims

 * 2017:
 * February-March:
 * Ron Carini
 * Jerry Hornsby
 * March 14: Reba Wilson
 * March 17: Pearl Roberts
 * March 18:
 * Bob Joplin
 * Mike Hood
 * March 19: Jon Kreutzmann and Lyn Anastasio
 * March 20: Paul McConnell
 * March 21: The attack at 122 Lyon Street:
 * Janis Weir
 * David Rossi

Appearances

 * Season Twelve
 * In the Dark