History Characters / TheWireHomelessPeopleAndAddicts

A homeless Iraq veteran that Scott Templeton interviews when trying to report on the serial killer. Terry tells a story about how his convoy was bombed by improvised explosive device and one of his squad members had his hands blown off. Scott sensationalizes the story by falsely reporting that their squad was in a firefight. This causes Terry to go to ''Sun'' to confront him. The ordeal ends up giving Gus more information about Templeton's dishonest nature.

* TheAlcoholic: He says he wouldn't sleep under a bridge sober. Gus tries to use this as a reason as to why the story may have been embellished, but Terry is insistent that he wouldn't misremember such a traumatic experience, even if he was drinking.
* {{Irony}}: Something he discusses about the nature of his fate compared to his squadmate. While he felt Terry got away lucky by not having his hands amputated, his squadmate is ironically doing much better after getting prosthetic hands, while Terry is still stuck haunted by him saying "Look ma, no hands" and is living homeless.

[[folder:The Fiend aka Bubble's Tormentor]]

[[folder:The Fiend]]

A large and intimidating homeless addict, he is encountered in the fourth season. After first encountering Bubbles, he takes to repeatedly beating and robbing Bubbles as a way to feed his drug habit.

The constant repetition of this, along with the repeated failure of Bubbles to find any legal help or recourse, will eventually drive Bubbles to take drastic action which ends tragically. He is also known as "Bubbles' Tormentor", as he's credited that way.

* ArchEnemy: Becomes this for Bubbles during Season 4.

* KarmaHoudini: For as much grief and pain as he inflicted on Bubbles and Sherrod, nothing happens to him. We never see ANY comeuppance for him at all. In the first episode of season 5, Bubbles spots him still roaming the alleys in a drugged out haze.

A homeless heroin addict. He mentors Johnny Weeks from seasons 1-3, teaching him the skills of scheming and scrounging that are necessary to support a life on the streets. When Weeks is attacked by members of the Barksdale crew, Bubbles renews his duties as a police informant, providing critical information to Greggs and [=McNulty=]. In season 4, Bubbs takes a different homeless youngster, Sherrod, under his wing. Unfortunately for Bubbs, the season also sees him being repeatedly beaten and robbed by another drug addict. As Kima and [=McNulty=] are no longer working drugs at that point, Bubbs must settle for snitching for the considerably less reliable Herc, who twice fails to come to Bubbles's aid. Bubbles pays Herc back for his incompetence by feeding him bad information that gets Herc in some trouble with his superiors, but his plan for dealing with the robber backfires, resulting in Sherrod's death. He turns himself in and attempts suicide, but is receives an uncharacteristic bit of mercy from Jay Landsman, who decides not to charge Bubbs and instead has Bubbs put into a detox ward where he's watched carefully to make sure he won't kill himself.

[[quoteright:749:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thefiendakabubblestormentor.png]]

A large and intimidating homeless addict, he is encountered in the fourth season. After first encountering Bubbles, he takes to repeatedly beating and robbing Bubbles as a way to feed his drug habit. The constant repetition of this, along with the repeated failure of Bubbles to find any legal help or recourse, will eventually drive Bubbles to take drastic action which ends tragically. He is also known as "Bubbles' Tormentor", as he's credited that way.

* EvilCounterpart: To Omar. Omar robs criminals and drug dealers for a living, while the fiend robs Bubbles, a petty thief, criminal, and occasional ConMan himself. The difference lies in how powerful and sympathetic their targets are. The fiend obviously takes much more pleasure in hurting people, and is robbing a much more sympathetic character who is considerably lower down the criminal food chain who has no chance of defending himself, which makes his actions cruel and despicable instead of cool and badass.

A large and intimidating homeless addict, he is encountered in the fourth season. After first encountering Bubbles, he takes to repeatedly beating and robbing Bubbles as a way to feed his drug habit. The constant repetition of this, along with the repeated failure of Bubbles to find any legal help or recourse, will eventually drive Bubbles to take drastic action which ends tragically.

[[folder:Larry]]

A homeless, mentally ill man abducted by [=McNulty=] and taken to a homeless shelter in Virginia.

----

* LossOfIdentity: [=McNulty=] passes him off as Donald from Cleveland. The poor man tries to say otherwise, but he can't help himself due to a disability.
* MoralityPet: Zigzagged for [=McNulty=], who abducts him, takes him to an unfamiliar place and deprives him of his identity and medication. On the other hand Jimmy feels bad about his scheme and is clearly torn apart when he sees the guy unable to feed himself. It's implied in the final scene of the finale that Jimmy is going to get the guy help.
* UnwittingPawn: A central piece of the "serial killer" scheme. The man has no idea what is going on.
[[/folder]]

* GuileHero: He manages to inform on various drug dealers for the better part of five seasons without ever being suspected of being a snitch, mostly because he's very clever in his information-gathering.

* EvilCounterpart: To Omar. Omar robs criminals and drug dealers for a living, while the fiend robs Bubbles, a petty thief, criminal, and occasional ConMan himself. The difference lies in how sympathetic their targets are and how they go about it. The fiend obviously takes much more pleasure in hurting people, and is robbing a much more sympathetic character who is considerably lower down the criminal food chain, which makes his actions cruel and despicable instead of cool and badass.

[[center: [- [[Characters/TheWire Main Character Index]] | [[Characters/TheWireBaltimorePoliceDepartment Baltimore Police Department]] | [[Characters/TheWireMajorCrimesUnit Major Crimes Unit]] | [[Characters/TheWireHomicideUnit Homicide Unit]] | [[Characters/TheWirePoliceCommanders Police Commanders]] | [[Characters/TheWireWesternDistrict Western District]] | [[Characters/TheWireBaltimoreUnderworld Baltimore Underworld]] | [[Characters/TheWireBarksdaleOrganization The Barksdale Organization]] | [[Characters/TheWireOmarAndAssociates Omar and Associates]] | [[Characters/TheWireTheGreeks The Greeks]] | [[Characters/TheWireStanfieldOrganization Stanfield Organization]] | [[Characters/TheWireNewDayCoOp New Day Co-Op]] | [[Characters/TheWireCourthouse Courthouse]] | [[Characters/TheWireCityHall City Hall]] | [[Characters/TheWireBaltimoreSun The Baltimore Sun]] | [[Characters/TheWireOtherCharacters Other Characters]] | '''Homeless People and Addicts''' | [[Characters/TheWireBaltimoreDocks Baltimore Docks]] | [[Characters/TheWireTheNextGeneration The Next Generation]]]]-]

A homeless heroin addict. He mentors Johnny Weeks from seasons 1-3, teaching him the skills of scheming and scrounging that are necessary to support a life on the streets. When Weeks is attacked by members of the Barksdale crew, Bubbles renews his duties a police informant, providing critical information to Greggs and [=McNulty=]. In season 4, Bubbs takes a different homeless youngster, Sherrod, under his wing. Unfortunately for Bubbs, the season also sees him being repeatedly beaten and robbed by another drug addict. As Kima and [=McNulty=] are no longer working drugs at that point, Bubbs must settle for snitching for the considerably less reliable Herc, who twice fails to come to Bubbles's aid. Bubbles pays Herc back for his incompetence by feeding him bad information that gets Herc in some trouble with his superiors, but his plan for dealing with the robber backfires, resulting in Sherrod's death. He turns himself in and attempts suicide, but is receives an uncharacteristic bit of mercy from Jay Landsman, who decides not to charge Bubbs and instead has Bubbs put into a detox ward where he's watched carefully to make sure he won't kill himself.

* TemptingFate: Johnny is ''constantly'' doing this, often mocking the idea of showing any restraint in how he uses drugs, and his boasts of how he can handle large amounts of drugs because "I'm a viking!" seem to imply he thinks he's immune to dying of an overdose. Eventually he is proved wrong.