Beware of spoilers, only spoilers from the seventh and eighth seasons are meant to be blacked out. All character sheets contain major spoilers. Proceed reading at your own risk.note
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Camilla Figg
Played by: Margo Martindale
A files clerk with a long history of helping out the Morgan family.
- Age Lift: In the novels, Camilla is a young woman with a crush on Dexter. In the show, she is an older woman who was friends with Dexter's parents.
- Deadpan Snarker: She has her smartass moments when she talks to Dexter in Season 1.
- I Cannot Self-Terminate: She would like to commit suicide, but can't because of her religious faith.
- Mercy Kill: She begs Dexter to kill her when she's in the final phase of lung cancer and suffers horribly.
- Secret-Keeper: She knew Dexter's background story, but never told anyone and obliged when Harry asked her to destroy the case file. She also knew that Brian Moser was Dexter's brother.
Francis
Played by: Tasia Sherel
A files clerk and friend of the Morgans.
- Gender-Blender Name: Her name is usually a boy's name.
- Nice Girl: Francis is a generally kind person, wanting to help both of the Morgan siblings (even to the point of bending rules just like Camilla Figg before her).
- Sassy Black Woman: Francis is of African American descent and is quite sassy.
Det. "Mack" McNamara
Played by: Scott William Winters
A detective who loses his sister and police officer brother-in-law to gang retaliation.
Deputy Director Max Adams
Played by: Jonathan Banks
The FBI Deputy Director who swoops in to take credit for the Bay Harbour Butcher case.
- Smug Snake: He's extremely condescending to Lundy and Debra.
Frank Lundy
"People like us don't really belong, we just pass through."
Played by: Keith Carradine
"I track killers. That's what I do. They tend to move around."
A high-ranking and illustrious FBI Special Agent recruited by Captain Thomas Matthews to lead the task force dedicated to identifying and arresting the Bay Harbor Butcher. He, Sgt. Doakes and Lila West serve as the main antagonists in Season 2.
- Ambiguous Situation: There are several hints in the latter half of season 2 that he suspects/knows Dexter is the Bay Harbor Butcher or at the least doesn't believe Doakes is the killer. After the detective's death and the bits of evidence pointing to him the case is closed. Its never explicitly stated if he accepts how things turned out and he dies in Season 4.
- Arch-Enemy: The Trinity Killer. The one serial killer that got away from his grip and the only thing he regrets not being able to do after he retires is failing to catch him.
- Awesomeness by Analysis: He is not fooled by Dexter's letter full of fake hints and false leads, and quickly deduces it was fabricated by a person knowledgeable of police procedures.
- Back for the Dead: He returns in season 4 after being absent for season 3, only to be killed a quarter of the way through the season.
- Badass in a Nice Suit: During his tenure with the FBI.
- Beware the Nice Ones: He is very affable and accommodating to his colleagues and generally comes off as a genial elderly gentlemen but that does not dampen his status as master criminal hunter. He drops his polite demeanor twice in Season 2. He becomes dead serious and quite intimidating in his interrogation of Dexter and later becomes very harsh and critical in his "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Laguerta when she fails to report in an important tip.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He eats animal crackers during interviews, he maintains odd habits and is generally a bit off. But there's a reason he's a renowned serial killer hunting badass.
- But Now I Must Go: As he says, he's sent around the country to track serial killers and can never stay in one place.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: He has several weird habits. For instance, he's obsessed with food and keeps making food and cooking references. He has to eat his lunch at one o'clock.
- Cool Old Guy: He's a really nice old guy who people think really highly of and respect.
- Deadpan Snarker: Prone to making sarcastic jokes when the mood is too tense.
- Famed In-Story: He's considered a 'Rock Star' among law enforcement.
- FBI Agent: A well-regarded and famous one. His bread and butter is catching serial killers. Even Sergeant Doakes is impressed with his career and people compare his fame to a rock star.
- Great Detective: Famed as one of the greatest Serial Killer hunters in the country.
- Hero Antagonist: Shares this role with Sgt. James Doakes in Season 2, though he is a much more traditional hero than the Cowboy Cop Doakes. Unlike the violently unstable Lila West who is a major antagonist AND villain in Season 2, Lundy is a thoroughly professional and ethical man. Nevertheless, he, like Lila, poses a preeminent threat to Dexter Morgan right up until the end of the second season.
- Last-Name Basis: Perfectly justified when used by characters at the police station, but even when they start knocking boots, Deb still calls him Lundy.
- May–December Romance: He hooks up with the much younger Deb. They are both aware of the age difference and their unequal pairing, him being the boss of their task force, but they still think it's worth it. Deb's age is somewhat unclear because Dexter is supposed to be only slightly older and he's in his late thirties, which would make Deb in her mid-to-late thirties, but she's treated as if she was in her twenties (which is the real-life age of her actress). They break up because they can't coordinate their demanding jobs with a long-distance relationship. In season 4, they rekindle their romance but they both get shot and Lundy dies in front of heartbroken Deb.
- Married to the Job: His place is wherever there is a major crime to be solved. After a case is concluded he moves on.
- Nice Guy: He's quite tactful, smiling and friendly. He also avoids confrontation when he doesn't see a benefit to it.
- The Profiler: His job at the FBI. And he rocks at this game, breaking several extremely hard cases.
- Put on a Bus: He leaves after the Bay Harbour Butcher case is solved at the end of season 2. The Bus Came Back: He returns in the fourth season as the cast investigates the Trinity Killer, who Lundy has been searching for his entire career.
- Schedule Fanatic: Always has his meals at the exact same time every day. We see him stop everything to eat lunch at 1 PM.
- Through His Stomach: He's somewhat obsessed with food and cooking. He cooks dinner for Deb on their first date. Adorably, he asked her brother Dexter about her food preferences. He barely starts cooking though because they find each other too irresistible and initiate sex. Later, he's seen trying to feed her, offering her a piece of lox in the office, to which she replies, "Gross."
- Worthy Opponent: Dexter explicitly calls him one, after he is killed. Even Trinity considers him one and refuses to harm him since he wants to be caught by him.
Lt. Esme Pascal
Played by: Judith Scott
A temporary replacement for LaGuerta brought in by Matthews to gain political points and punish LaGuerta.
- Bad Boss: She quickly grows paranoid, makes poor decisions, makes her workforce carry out personal tasks for her and basically becomes a mess.
- Deliberately Bad Example: LaGuerta may be politically ambitious, but she at least tends to be more focused on her cases. In contrast, Esme tends to use resources for personal reasons. Not helped by La Guerta sleeping with her fiance.
- "Not So Different" Remark: During her first meeting with LaGuerta it turns out that they actually do have a lot in common, and it's suggested that they might be able to work together harmoniously after all. Unfortunately, between LaGuerta's refusing to take her demotion without a fight and Pascal's unsuitability for the job, this state of affairs doesn't last long.
- Properly Paranoid: She suspects her fiancée is cheating on her. She's completely right. If only she could deal with it without acting like a crazy bitch.
- Replacement Goldfish: Matthews replaces LaGuerta with her, mostly just to get the support of the Latino and African-American community.
- Sanity Slippage: She steadily unravels as she begins to suspect her fiancee of cheating on her.
- Tyrant Takes the Helm: She replaces LaGuerta, who's hardly a nice boss, but Pascal's lack of professionalism and incompetence make her brief reign a major inconvenience for Miami Metro.
Yuki Amado
Played by: Liza Lapira
An Internal Affairs investigator who tries to recruit Debra to help take down Quinn.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: She, and her entire subplot, disappear without resolution.
- Good Is Not Soft: She's a smug jerk, but she's trying to root out corruption.
- Internal Affairs: She works for Internal Affairs and does her job well.
Barbara Gianna
Played by: Kristen Dattilo
A detective within Miami Metro's Vice Division. She meets Angel while working undercover, and later dates him.
- Deadpan Snarker: She wastes no time snarking like crazy at Angel when they first meet.
- Embarrassing Nickname: She says she had one at school. It was a "giant..." Well, look at her name.
- Fair Cop: She has to be one. She works at Vice and goes undercover as a hooker to bust customers.
- Honey Trap: She was working undercover as a hooker.
- Put on a Bus: As from season 4, Angel and Gianna stop seeing each other, and we don't get to see her ever again.
Ramon Prado
Played by: Jason Manuel Olazabal
The hotheaded detective brother of Miguel Prado.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Puts a random mook through it while trying to find his brother's killer.
- Good Is Not Nice: He may be an asshole, but he's far from an evil character. He just wants his brother's killer to face justice.
- Jerkass: Majorly. He's aggressive, rude and insults the abilities of the Miami Metro department to their faces.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He really just wants to find closure for the death of his brothers.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: He goes off the rails trying to find his brother's murderer, resorting to abduction and torture.
Cira Manzon
Played by: April L Hernandez
A competent young officer who Debra takes under her wing.
- Ambition Is Evil: She's convinced to pin the blame on Debra for a botched sting operation.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: While she was genuinely friendly to Deb, Cira did end up putting the blame on Deb for the botched sting operation. Unsurprisingly, this ended any potential friendship between the two.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: She doesn't appear after season 5, and her absence is not explained.
- Fair Cop: Cira is an attractive officer. She chosen to go in as a low-key Dirty Harriet to apprend a dangerous gang leader.
- Put on a Bus: Despite her promotion, she isn't seen again after her arc.
Jim McCourt
Played by: Raphael Sbarge
An abrasive internal affairs agent investigating Angel's altercation with a fellow officer.
- Good Is Not Nice: He's a by-the-book cop who wants to solve the case, but he's an abrasive jerk.
- Internal Affairs: He is an Internal Affairs agent that originally appears to work on a case between Sergeant Angel Batista and Sergeant Lopez.
- Slimeball: Subverted. He asks La Guerta if it is true that she gives the best blow jobs in Miami, as said by Lopez on the night of the fight, sparking the possibility of an affair between him and her. When Batista persuades Lopez to drop the charges, McCourt is unwilling to close the case that easily. He then talks to La Guerta and gives her a chance to drop the case entirely if she'll help him nail a dirty Narcotics cop named Detective Stan Liddy.
Ryan Chambers
"I've always been fascinated by people who do bad things."
Played by: Brea Grant
A sexy new intern in the Forensics Department.
- Aborted Arc: There seemed to be a lot more going on with her at first: her budding romance with Masuka, her theft of the Ice Truck Killer evidence...but she's abruptly revealed to only be after money and is fired with nary a mention of her since.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Everyone's reaction to her.
- Head-Turning Beauty: Everybody (Masuka, Quinn, Angel) has this reaction upon seeing her.
- Ms. Fanservice: There are many loving shots of her ass, and she wears tight revealing clothes.
- Nightmare Fetishist: Although it's possible this was only just an act in order to get pieces of evidence from famous cases to sell online.
- Only in It for the Money: She gets herself fired after stealing from the evidence locker, selling an item from the Ice Truck Killer case online.
- Put on a Bus: After Masuka finds out what she did (she broke the chain of custody and screwed him over), he fires her.
Det. Michael "Mike" Anderson
Played by: Billy Brown
A transfer from Chicago who has an astounding solve rate and according to Deb, "had recommendations coming out the ass".
- Badass in a Nice Suit: Always dressed very sharp.
- Born Detective: Much like Debra, he has a natural gift for
- Dropped a Bridge on Him: After being introduced and having some importance in Season 6, he is very unceremoniously shot and killed in the first episode of Season 7. It can probably be chalked up to Billy Brown getting a recurring role on Sons of Anarchy between seasons.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Stopping to help some poor guy with car troubles gets him killed.
- Noble Bigot with a Badge: At first he dismisses Debra because of her gender and youth, but quickly apologises and proves to be a competent, trustworthy man.
- Number Two: He quickly becomes Debra's trusted right-hand man.
- Suspiciously Similar Substitute: A somewhat aggressive, no-nonsense black cop who doubted Dexter.
Louis Greene
Played by: Josh Cooke
A newly-hired tech-savvy intern.
- Aborted Arc: In a case of Real Life Writes the Plot. Josh Cooke got a role in a major Broadway production, and therefore Louis' arc had to be cut short. See Dropped a Bridge On Him for the in-universe details.
- Asshole Victim: It's hard to feel sorry for him when he's killed by the The Mafiya.
- Big Bad Wannabe: He wants to ruin Dexter's life, but he's pretty pathetic and is quickly ousted by more serious villains.
- Broken Pedestal: He gets quite shaken when Dexter calls his serial killer simulation "tasteless".
- Disproportionate Retribution:
- After Dexter shuts down the premise of his game, Louis dedicates an unreasonable amount of effort to get back at Dexter, including mailing him the Ice Truck Killer hand, and cancelling all his credit cards.
- He also did this to a former co-worker for equally petty reasons by putting a bunch of child pornography on his computer and getting him arrested for it.
- Dropped a Bridge on Him: Season 6 hinted strongly that he knew Dexter was a serial killer and would become the next big threat to him. In Season 7, he's a nuisance to Dexter at best, he doesn't actually know about Dexter being a serial killer, and he is killed in the third episode by The Mafiya.
- Evil Is Petty: His masterplan involves sinking Dexter's boat very gradually.
- Fanboy: He's in total awe every time he watches Dexter decipher a crime scene.
- Humiliation Conga: Fired, dumped and then murdered for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. That's a humiliation parade.
- Otaku: It's hinted that his interest in famous serial killers borders on unhealthy obsession and admiration.
- The Smart Guy: He has unmatched abilities at hacking information to help the rest of Miami Metro Homicide.
- Smug Snake: After Dexter threatens him, he still walks right into Miami Metro with a shit-eating smirk as if he's a king.
- Techno Wizard: He basically does magic with computers whenever Masuka needs him to.
Det. Angie Miller
Played by: Dana L. Wilson
A no-BS African-American divorcee with two kids who joins the Homicide division.
- Ascended Extra: She was only a background character in season 7, but as of season 8, she has plenty of speaking lines.
Dr. Evelyn Vogel
Played by: Charlotte Rampling
"I believe that psychopaths are not a mistake of Nature; they're a gift. They're alpha wolves, who helped the human race survive long enough to become civilized. An indispensable demographic. Psychopathic traits can be found in the most successful CEOs, in the most effective politicians. Without psychopaths, Mankind wouldn't exist today."
An intelligent neuro-psychiatrist specializing in profiling psychopaths who acts as a consultant for various law enforcement agencies assisting in their investigations.
Vogel arrives in Miami to aide in the investigation of a serial killer known as The Brain Surgeon, helping profile and instruct Miami Metro Homicide as a consultant. She meets with Dexter Morgan here and in time reveals that she knows about the Code of Harry, as well as that Dexter is a psychopath and serial killer.
- Admiring the Abomination: She's more than fascinated by psychopaths and praises them as a force of Nature.
- Ambiguously Evil: She has some rather creepy mannerisms and believes that psychopaths are needed for humanity to develop, but she hasn't been anything but helpful. Even with the revelation of her new book about Dexter, she doesn't have any truly evil intentions.
- ...And That Would Be Wrong: When Dexter tells her about Debra's downward spiral, she asks why Dexter didn't kill her when she found out the truth about him... Not that she would ever advocate such a thing.
- Love Makes You Dumb: Shows a no-nonsense survival instinct in dealing with the many psychopaths she's dealt with, until she finds out one of them is her son, whereupon her behavior turns so heedless of the danger as to be practically self-destructive.
- The Man Behind the Man: She was the one who created Harry's code.
- Parental Substitute: Treated as Dexter's mother in more than a symbolic sense.Vogel: When Harry and I came up with the Code, he insisted that you only kill bad people, and I insisted that the first rule of the Code be, "Don't get caught."
- The Profiler: She acts as a consultant for various law enforcement agencies, assisting in their investigations profiling serial killers.
- Red Baron: She is referred and called the Psychopath Whisper.
- Shipper on Deck: She can't stop gushing about how utterly perfect Dexter and Hannah are for each other.
- The Shrink: A neuropsychiatrist who has treated dozens of psychopaths.
- Slashed Throat: Courtesy of her dearly deranged son.
- Small Role, Big Impact: Never appears before the last season, but she's the one who helped Harry invent "The Code" and all Dexter's life and actions are based on that Code.
- The Social Darwinist: Views psychopaths as a necessary evil to cull mankind's weaknesses, as illustrated by her presiding quote up there.
- Unscrupulous Hero: Despite being amoral and calculating, the Code she developed proved pivotal in helping Dexter control his bloodlust and eliminate far more dangerous and sinister serial murderers like the Ice Truck Killer, Trinity and Jordan Chase. Additionally, in order to protect Dexter from "unnecessary distractions", she does more than anyone else to rescue Debra from her suicidal downward spiral.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: She developed Dexter's Code primarily as a means to guide psychopaths like her son to advance the interests of society and humanity itself.
