Diane Wittlesey
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Officer Diane Wittlesey is a fictional character played by Edie Falco on the television program Oz. She is a divorced woman who suffered spousal abuse, poverty, drug abuse and alcoholism and through all of that she gained a pretty good understanding of criminal life. She is a correctional officer in the Oswald Maximum Security Penitentiary, and she only works there because she can't find work anywhere else. Her only drive is taking care of her mother, who is sick with cancer, and her young daughter who she has to raise all by herself. There is no other reason why she does that, as she despises her job. She works double shifts, sometimes sleeping in the prison, just to make ends meet.
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[edit] Season 1 (1997)
She is the CO supervisor of Emerald City, Tim McManus' experimental cellblock. She helps to keep records of the prisoners and to stop any ensuing trouble should it ever arise. Eventually, she and McManus fall in love (more of an empathetic relationship, as they both felt depressed on the day Jefferson Keane was executed, but after McManus professed his love to her and she could not help but feel the same), and even have sex inside of an empty cell as a comfort to each other. However, when the two of them receive flack from their fellow staff members over their relationship, she breaks it off with him. Eventually, she gets some bad news -- Oz had made a contract with the Department of Corrections that, as a condition, will no longer allow officers to work overtime, which means less cash for Wittlesey. More trouble arises for her when Scott Ross enters Oz. He was a biker on the outside, as he and her ex-husband used to be in the same biker gang. He has an obsession with her, as on the outside he tried many times to have sex with her behind her husband's back, and decides to "help her out" -- he knows about her situation at home, how she isn't making enough to provide for her daughter and mother. Therefore, he proposes that she smuggle cigarettes for him and he will give her extra cash. She agrees reluctantly, but when McManus finds out, he tells her to stop. He doesn't fire her, though, knowing she's only trying to make money for her loved ones. When Ross gets wind of this, though, he threatens to rat her out to the warden and she will lose everything she has worked for. However, she doesn't have to worry about that. She ends up caught in a vicious riot in Emerald City, planned by the prisoners. She is taken hostage, fearing for her life with other hostages, and with nowhere to run, but eventually the SORT team breaks in and ends the riot. During the adrenaline and action, Ross takes a gun and shoots McManus with it (who volunteered to be captive in return for letting two critically injured officers out for treatment). Wittlesey later takes that gun and kills Ross with it unbeknownst to everyone but a short few.
[edit] Season 2 (1998)
As Alvah Case case investigates what caused the riot, he notices that Scott Ross was shot execution style. Meanwhile, while patrolling Unit B, Schillinger tells Wittlesey that he saw her kill Ross and that he will make sure that she will be exposed for it. When Case confronts Wittlesey about she admitts to killing Ross and that her life is hard because she is the only one taking care of her mother, her daughter, and herself. Glynn convinces Case that Wittlesey is the best CO he's ever had, that she is struggling to get enough money, and that it will be stupid to charge her with murdering a scumbag like Scott Ross. Feeling sorry for Wittlesey, Case rules that Ross was killed by bullets from the SORT team members.
Schillinger has a problem with Tobias Beecher; Beecher is trying to mess up his parole hearing, and Vern wants Beecher dead. He proposes to Wittlesey that if she helps him kill him, she will be paid large and once paroled, his knowledge of her murder of Ross goes with him. She turns the tables against him, though, and sets him up to be charged with conspiracy to commit murder. To get back at her, Schillinger rats her out, saying she killed Ross. Wittlesey denies it to McManus, but he was the one who saw her. Eventually, she decides to move from her cellblock back to Emerald City, where she surprisingly shows interest in McManus again, only it seems he has moved on from the relationship. Thus continued their complicated relationship. However, romance or no romance, their destinies are intertwined, as McManus decides to investigate Ross' murder himself, suspecting she is the murderer. She admits to him that she did do it, but only because Ross shot him first. Eventually, they'd be hit hard with this knowledge. Schillinger went up to Kareem Said, who was handling cases for various prisoners, and asked him to represent him on the conspiracy to commit murder charge, of which he continued to accuse Wittlesey of killing Ross. Said interrogated McManus and Wittlesey during the case about the murder, and the both of them lied. Thus, eventually, the truth was buried once more with no proof. However, McManus was ridden with guilt for lying, and decided to transfer her out of Emerald City and into Unit B. She did.
[edit] Season 3 (1999)
Wittlesey continues to work in Unit B, and finds another female correctional officer working with her, Officer Claire Howell. There is already tension between them once she shows her grit for not needing any friends and much to her slight jealousy, Howell takes an interest in McManus. However, the love triangle is complicated when Wittlesey gets some bad news -- her mother had died of the cancer in the hospital. McManus comforts her, which stirs up tension in his relationship with Howell. Eventually, she decides to sue him for sexual harassment, something which Wittlesey immediately takes a disliking to Howell for. "Accusing him of sexual harassment is an insult to women who have been abused, [like me]," she says. Wittlesey takes McManus' side on the matter, and during this ordeal, the two of them appear to get closer once more. In the end, McManus asks Wittlesey to get back with him, and she consents (in her own way). Their romance will have to wait a while, though, as recently there is a lot of racial tension within Oz. Threats of a riot are imminent, and even though the entire prison is put into lockdown, Wittlesey fears for going through another riot. She decides to take her leave of vacation. She decides to go to England with her daughter.
[edit] Season 4 (2000)
Her vacation was supposed to be finished, but she never came back to Oz, much to McManus' disappointment and agitation, since he intended to propose to her upon her return. She phoned Sister Peter Marie Reimondo, and she explained why -- on her vacation in England, she met a guard of the queen, and one thing led to another -- and now they're going to get married. McManus doesn't take this news well at all, and when she sends a personal letter to him about what happened, things get worse for him. Eventually, she decides to call him but the conversation does not go well. And that is the last we hear of her.
At least now she and her daughter have a peaceful life in England with a fine young man as a husband and stepfather.
