Leland Duncan

"Do you confess your crimes?"

Leland Duncan was a psychotic serial killer, vigilante, and abductor who appeared in In The Blood.

Background
Leland's biological parents both died in an car accident while staying in Ecuador with the Peace Corps, so he was adopted by the Duncans. His biological parents were descendants of an 17th-century judge who ruthlessly ordered for the executions of women who were accused of being witches during the Salem witch trials. In his adulthood, Leland moved to Salt Lake City, Utah, which was home to a library detailing one's ancestry; he became a volunteer librarian there. Sometime prior to "In The Blood", his adoptive parents died. Leland also looked up his ancestry and found that he was a descendant of the judge, triggering a delusion in which he believed he inherited a moral obligation to hunt down and execute witches. This motivated him to kill Emma Stafford, a college student addicted to cocaine, whom he threw off a cliff after torturing her. This was followed by Gloria Carlyle, whom he killed by burying her in a tomb of rocks, effectively crushing her to death. These methods of killing were directly based on a book on witchcraft from the library, which he became enamored with.

In The Blood
The day following Gloria's murder, Leland is first seen working at the library, where he is asked by Yvonne Carpenter to check out the witchcraft book. He nervously replies that it is a reference book that cannot be checked out, but she could use a copy-machine in another room to scan any desirable pages. When Yvonne decides to just leave the book behind, a man named Parker Mills volunteers to scan the book for her. Intimidated by Parker's appearance, Yvonne leaves the library with her daughter Kylie, but Parker begins stalking Yvonne. In the meantime, the BAU, being called in to investigate Gloria's murder, finds Emma's body. Apparently finding out that Parker was a repeat voyeur, Leland attacks him in the middle of the night, hanging him in a public city square before projecting hallucinations of cloaked figures holding lit torches. The next day, he finds out from his boss, Charlotte Novak, that Yvonne checked out the book. Enraged, Leland follows and drugs both Yvonne and Kylie, taking them to an abandoned shack left in his adoptive parents' name. When Yvonne regains consciousness, he accuses her and Kylie of being witches, under a delusion that the two of them were under court. Presumably using information she learned from the witchcraft book, Yvonne convinces Leland that Kylie is a witch hunter who was trying to cleanse her, prompting Leland to apparently release Kylie.

Later that day, Leland returns to the library for unspecified reasons, apparently to try to steal another witchcraft book. Charlotte catches him in the act, and he is forced to kill her. He then returns to the shack and tells Yvonne that Kylie has been released, but then tells her that she has been found guilty of being a witch and will be sentenced to death by burning at a stake. The following night, he forcibly takes her outside, hallucinating 17th-century townspeople yelling at Yvonne and declaring her guilty of practicing witchcraft. Yvonne spots Kylie's unconscious form lying nearby, and Leland tells her that despite being a witch hunter, Kylie is still declared a witch since she is indeed the daughter of a witch, therefore she will be sentenced the same fate as Yvonne's. He then ties a sobbing Yvonne onto the stake and prepares to set the debris below it on fire, just before the BAU arrive and hold him at gunpoint. When his projections of the townspeople begin to disappear, Leland yells to them that Kylie has convinced the BAU is protecting Yvonne before charging at Kylie, attempting to kill her. The BAU promptly shoot him, mortally wounding him. As he dies, Leland watches as the last of the townspeople disappear. The cloaked figures with the torches then appear, walking up to him, apparently to burn him.

Modus Operandi
Leland targeted blonde, pretty women, although he also moved on to other victims as his M.O. began to involve. He always found his victims through his job as a volunteer librarian, selecting them by whether they displayed interest in a book of witchcraft he had selected. After drugging them, abducting them, and taking them to the abandoned shack, he would torture them by non-fatally slashing their arms and branding a symbol them with a fire-poker. Then, he would kill them in various ways based on the witchcraft book: Emma Stafford was thrown off a cliff, Gloria Carlyle was stoned to death, and Parker Mills was hanged. As his M.O. continued to evolve, he began using other methods of executing witches, such as trying to burn Yvonne Carpenter at a stake. His first three victims were also targeted due to being perceived by him as sinners in some way: Emma Stafford was a drug addict, Gloria Carlyle rejected a utopia sect to move in with her boyfriend, and Parker Mills was a repeat voyeur. Emma Stafford and Gloria Carlyle were both murdered at a remote canyon, but Parker Mills was hanged in a public city square as Leland began to evolve his M.O. After his murder of Emma Stafford, Leland would begin stripping his victims of anything modern, including contacts, nail polish, and clothing, before dressing them in simple, 17th-century-styled robes.

Profile
The unsub is a physically fit male aged in his late-20s to mid-30s who is brazen, confident, and organized. He may be a moral vigilante, a pathology that typically has its roots in repression and guilt that generally manifests itself in low self-esteem and self-loathing. By punishing others, the unsub may also be punishing himself. He is also literally branding his victims, likely marking them as his own. His organizational skills suggest that the unsub is someone who can get and keep a full-time job, which is likely low-level. His impaired social development would not allow him to move very far in the professional world, and consequently, this is someone most comfortable working in solitude, having minimal interactions with others. This makes it a challenge for authorities to discover how and where the unsub choose his victims. The first two female victims were reserved and studious, while Mills lived quietly in the margins of conventional society, so the killer may frequent or work in locations of solitude and contemplation that attracts this type of person, such as museums, gardens, parks, and bookstores. His choice of a city square rather than a remote canyon to kill Parker Mills means he is gaining confidence, but the recklessness of killing in such a public space suggests that this confidence may be stemming from a delusion. He may believe he is in a place and time that makes him invulnerable, and if his delusion is gaining in strength, then his next killing is likely riskier and more dramatic.

Known Victims

 * 2013:
 * October 22-23: Emma Stafford
 * October 29: Gloria Carlyle
 * October 30: Parker Mills
 * October 31:
 * Yvonne Carpenter and her daughter Kylie :
 * Yvonne Carpenter
 * Kylie Carpenter
 * Charlotte Novak

Appearances

 * Season Nine
 * "In The Blood"