Jack Crawford (character)

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Scott Glenn as Crawford in The Silence of the Lambs

Jack Crawford is a supporting character appearing in the Hannibal Lecter series of books by Thomas Harris, in which he is in charge of the Behavioral Science Unit of the FBI in Quantico, Virginia. He is modeled after John E. Douglas, who held the same position. Crawford was played by Dennis Farina (in the film Manhunter, based on the book Red Dragon), Scott Glenn (in the film version of The Silence of the Lambs) and Harvey Keitel (in the film version of Red Dragon).

In the books, Crawford is a friend and mentor to the two heroes, Will Graham and Clarice Starling.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

His first appearance is in the book Red Dragon, where he calls upon Graham, his former protegé, to ask for his assistance in solving the murders being committed by the "Tooth Fairy." As a profiler, Graham had a reputation for being able to think like the criminals he hunted, thus making it possible for the FBI to apprehend them. He had retired after being attacked and nearly killed by Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a Baltimore psychiatrist who had helped the FBI on several occasions, after Graham intuited that he was the serial killer he sought. Crawford convinced Graham to come out of retirement to help solve the "Tooth Fairy" murders, and soon they both realized that they would need Lecter's help again. Crawford helped shelter Graham and his family after Lecter sent the killer, Francis Dolarhyde, his old nemesis' address. They eventually solved the case, but Dolarhyde permanently disfigured Graham before he was finally killed. Crawford was haunted with guilt and resented Lecter for the rest of his life.

Crawford appears again in The Silence of the Lambs, once again investigating a serial killer, this one known as "Buffalo Bill," and once again needing to call upon the services of Dr. Lecter. This time, he sent a trainee, Clarice Starling, to interview him. By way of information obtained from Lecter, Crawford and the FBI attempted to track down the killer, Jame Gumb. However, the address they obtained for him was out of date. Gumb had killed the employer of one of his former victims and moved into her house to use its large basement as a torture chamber. Realizing that Buffalo Bill probably knew his first victim, Fredrica Bimmel, Starling set about interviewing everyone close to her, and ended up stumbling upon Gumb's house. All of Gumb's victims had been large women, so her suspicions were aroused when Gumb asked if Bimmel was "a great big fat person." Upon stepping inside, she saw a Death's Head moth like the ones that Buffalo Bill stuffed into his victims' throats, and realized she had found the killer. She pursued him into his basement, where she fatally shot him and rescued his last victim, whom Gumb was about to kill when she knocked on his door. Crawford did not arrive until afterwards.

Lecter appeared to like Crawford, after a fashion. While he was initially offended at the idea of his sending a mere trainee to interview him at the beginning of Silence, he nonetheless displayed none of the ill-will toward him that he held for Frederick Chilton or Will Graham. He even described him as "stoic". During the events of The Silence of the Lambs, Crawford's wife, Bella, dies of cancer. Lecter somehow finds out and sends him a few lines from John Donne's "The Feaver" with the salutation, "I'm so sorry about Bella, Jack." Crawford was offended by the gesture and momentarily lost his trust in Starling, thinking, incorrectly, she had told Lecter about his personal life.

Crawford appears as a relatively minor character in the book Hannibal, and dies close to the end of a heart attack. Rather than calling the hospital, he moves to his wife's side of the bed to die peacefully. Clarice still managed to visit him again in her 'memory palace' that was modeled after Hannibal's. He does not appear in the film. A deleted line of dialogue refers to him having died between films.

Red Dragon was filmed first in 1986 as Manhunter, in which Crawford is played by Dennis Farina. In the remake, Red Dragon (2002), he is played by Harvey Keitel. In the film version of The Silence of the Lambs (1991), Crawford is played by Scott Glenn.