Tommy Wheeler

"I'll burn the whole town down."

Tommy Wheeler is a serial arsonist and mass murderer who appeared in Season Four of Criminal Minds.

History
"Boom."

When he was five, Tommy's parents died in a house fire, and he and his sister Tina were sent to live with their grandparents in Royal, Indiana. Tommy was more traumatized by the fire and the death of their parents than Tina, showing signs of being emotionally unbalanced. Over time, Tommy became fixated on Tina, his sister having become his entire world, disturbing the townspeople, who came to believe Tommy's love for his sister was incestuous. Word spread quickly of Tommy's "depravity" and he became a pariah, even being expelled from school due to the rumors. In 1998, Tommy and Tina made plans to go to the Spring Formal, which was being held in the community center. On the night of the dance, Tommy was attacked and brutally beaten by a group of grown men outside the community center, sustaining numerous injuries (including broken bones and a punctured lung) and nearly dying. No real effort was made to investigate the attack, as no one, not even Tommy, would talk about it. Fearing for their grandson's life, Tommy's grandparents, after talking to the chief of police, sent Tommy to a Colorado boarding school, severed all ties between him and Tina and changed his surname to Boren, his mother's maiden name. Tommy attended school for a year and a half, but was sentenced to juvenile hall for three years for an unspecified crime, presumably for setting a fire. Released when he was sixteen, Tommy fell off the grid for five years, eventually resurfacing in Franklin, where he purchased a large amount of gasoline and started several nuisance fires, burning a trash can, Christmas tree and abandoned shed. After those fires, Tommy disappeared again, laying low for some time before returning to Royal in 2009, where he began an arson spree, setting fire to a convenience store, a restaurant, and the recreation center. The first two fires were victimless, while the recreation center one killed twelve people.

Two days after the recreation center fire, Tommy burns down a theater, sealing the exits and turning off the main waterline to ensure fatalities. A total of nineteen people died with no survivors. Hours later, as most of the townspeople and the BAU are attending a memorial service for all those who have died in the fires, Tommy enters Pop's Place, a bar owned by Tina's husband Jason Elliot. Continually switching seats in the bar to get a good layout of the place, Tommy leaves, seals the exits, pours a large amount of gasoline and throws a Molotov cocktail through the window, causing the bar to erupt in flames, killing four (including Jason) and hospitalizing the bartender, who presumably died later on. Returning to his hideout, Tommy broods for some time, trying to write a letter, but scraping them multiple times. Most of these attempted letters started with "All I ask...", and one letter is seen reading, "All I ask is for one last dance." Then, he traveled to Tina's home, where he forcibly takes her to the community center. There, Tommy admits to being the arsonist, telling Tina he killed her husband and the other townspeople so they could not stop them from being together, claiming they are soul mates. Becoming more and more erratic, Tommy begins trying to make Tina remember the Spring Formal, which he begins hallucinating. When Tina begins rejecting him due to all that he has done and the fact they were siblings, Tommy grows agitated, his condition worsened when the police and BAU, who had discovered his past and tracked him down, burst in. Refusing Hotch and Carlson's orders to let Tina go, Tommy knocks over a can of gasoline and lights a match, threatening to kill himself and Tina and possibly "burn the whole town down". Appealing to his love for Tina, Hotch and Rossi manage to calm Tommy down, causing him to regain his senses and let Tina go. Dropping the burnt out match, Tommy tells Tina he loves her as is he handcuffed and hauled away by the police. Because of the hallucinations, his obsession with Tina and fire, and his delusion of him and Tina being the only residents in their hometown with no one to bother them anymore, he is probably deemed unfit for trial and institutionalized.

Profile
The fires of the recreational center, restaurant and movie theater were all indicative of a "revenge arsonist", someone who is seeking retaliation for a perceived injustice, whether real or imagined. Revenge arsonists often target group headquarters, such as churches or government buildings. This unsub chose local gathering places with a large numbers of potential victims inside. It's clear that he had chosen to target the community as a whole. That meant that the arsonist was a local, someone who lived or grew up in Royal, Indiana. Despite the fact that he was from Royal, however, he felt like an outsider, as if his community had wronged him in some type of way. The fires were his way of striking back, trying to drawing attention to himself. The fires not only killed innocent people, it also gave the unsub a sense of power over the community, choosing who lived and who died. But somehow, the first few fires were lacking. They didn't exact the correct measure of punishment or attract enough attention or they didn't attract the attention of a certain person. Like most arsonists, he liked to watch the fires he created, relishing the destruction.

The bar fire didn't increase the number of victims, as the first two fatal fires went from twelve to nineteen casualties, but reduced them. That's the reason the third fire was key. The unsub wasn't striking out at the community as a whole anymore, he was then striking out at one or more individuals. This type of rage would stem from things or memories people tend to keep buried, things they just don't talk about.

Modus Operandi
Tommy set fires primarily with gasoline and matches, though the bar fire was started with a Molotov cocktail. To ensure his fires would cause the most fatalities, Tommy would block or lock all the available exits, disable all fire suppression equipment, and also start one or two smaller fires, meaning that no matter how fast the fire department responded, the victims would likely all be dead, usually from smoke inhalation caused by the main fire and the companion ones. He wore gloves to ensure that he didn't leave behind fingerprints, but would take one off in order to light a match with his thumb.

Known Victims

 * Unspecified dates, Franklin, Indiana: Set at least three minor victimless fires
 * 2009, Royal, Indiana:
 * Unspecified dates: Two victimless fires at a convenience store and a restaurant
 * March 22: Twelve killed in the recreation center fire. Named victims are:
 * Alex Nagel
 * Mayor Flip Phillips
 * March 24: Nineteen killed in the theater fire. Named victims are:
 * Rick Bradford
 * Cathy Duncan
 * Gary Grimshaw
 * Linda Grimshaw
 * Van Hawkins
 * Windy Kennedy
 * Jesse Smith
 * Michelle Smith
 * Other victims of either the recreation center or theater fires:
 * Andrew Alexander
 * David Alexander
 * Jean Alexander
 * Buck Ford
 * Donna Howard
 * Mary James
 * Carolyn Jones
 * Ann King
 * Bruce Long
 * Robert Lucas
 * James Madison
 * Barbara Matthews
 * Lawrence Powell
 * Alan Thompson
 * Alice Thompson
 * Betty Thompson
 * Mark Tong
 * Heather Young
 * Three unidentified others
 * March 25:
 * Four killed, and one injured, in the Pop's Place bar fire. The victims are:
 * Jason Elliot
 * Eric Gall
 * Roger Drake
 * Hilda Drake
 * Nancy Scott
 * Tina Wheeler

Appearances

 * Season Four
 * "House on Fire"