Characters / Cold Case Main And Supporting Characters

Main Characters

Detective Lilly Rush

" It's so much easier to believe monsters do these things. Not men."

Played By: Kathryn Morris

• Alone with the Psycho: In "Mind Hunters", "The Woods", and "Stalker" she has a face-off with the killer, trying to talk him down.
• Big Sister Instinct: Despite her terrible relationship with her sister throughout the series, in the finale, she goes all out to find her when Christina kidnapped by her abusive boyfriend and is ready to kill the guy. The final moments of the finale indicate that she's going to do everything she can to take care of her sister and newfound niece.
• Broken Bird: Lilly's hard exterior protects a broken interior, as she is afraid to get hurt again and refuses to let anyone in, which is a significant factor in her relationship failures.
• Damsel in Distress: Has a higher tendency to be shot, kidnapped or thrown off a bridge than other characters, specially in season finales.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Lilly's parents were both alcoholics, and her father abandoned her when she was six due to his toxic relationship with her mother. Her mother neglected her, preferring alcohol over her children, forcing Lilly to take on the unappreciated role of the caretaker of the family. When she was 10, this resulted in Lilly getting violently assaulted as her mother had her sent out in the night to get her more alcohol. Once she thought she would finally be happy and got engaged, her sister and her fiancé slept together.
• The Dutiful Daughter: Despite her mother's neglect, Lilly keeps taking care of Ellen when she needs her.
• Dying Dream: She has one in “Into the Blue”, putting together the clues of the current case while she is drowning.
• The Hero: Established in the pilot as The Hero of the show as she instigates the investigation of a cold case, refusing to give up or to be intimidated. She's always concerned with getting justice for the dead, no matter who they were.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: Lilly Rush has two cats that she adores. One of them is missing a leg, the other an eye.
• Married to the Job: Her job has caused her to break off a relationship and that's only in the last seven to eight years.
• Mommy Issues: Her mother, Ellen, was an alcoholic who neglected her and never appreciated Lilly for taking care of her. This has caused her to develop major trust issues, and she becomes extremely suspicious of women that remind her of her mother.
• My Sister Is Off-Limits: Lilly is less than thrilled to learn that Scotty has been seeing hers.
• Noodle Incident: One reason that her relationship with her sister is so strained is that Christina stole Lily's fiancé in the 90s but the whole incident has never been fully explained.
• Parental Abandonment: Her father left the family when Lilly was a child due to his toxic relationship with her mother, later telling her he couldn't stay with Ellen and survive. She reconnected with him as an adult, by when he'd already gotten his life together and started a new family.
• Parental Neglect: Her mother Ellen neglected her due to her alcoholism, at one point sending her out to get a drink in the middle of the night, resulting in Lilly being violently assaulted. Ellen didn't take care of her after that, and refused to take responsibility for it, even decades later.
• The Smurfette Principle: Until Kat became a regular, Lilly was (famously) the only female homicide detective.
• Tragic Keepsake: Lilly keep pictures of the victims on her night desk when she is working on a case and she shown in multiple episodes to keep the pictures of the case she solved in a box. Lampshaded by Kat who note it's kinda creepy when you think about it, but Lilly say that's a way to remember that there are real people behind every cases.
• Two Girls to a Team: After Kat joins the squad.
• The Un-Favorite: To her mother, who prefers her sister Christina despite the fact that it is Lilly who keeps taking care of her.
• Vigilante Execution: A major part of her character arc in the final season is whether or not she'd ever be willing to cross this line. She considers killing Moe Kitchener after he pulls a Karma Houdini in court but Kitchener's victim's father beats her to him. Then she has to talk down Diane Yates from doing this to Paul Shepard in "Bullet." In the Grand Finale, however, she finally decides to do it to her sister's abusive boyfriend... only for Scotty, who in the prior episode had become accessory in the death of a serial rapist, to tell her it isn't worth it.
• White Sheep: She is the only upstanding member of the family. Her mother is an alcoholic who neglected her children her whole life, her sister is involved in crimes, gets hopped up on doxy, and ends up having a relationship (and baby) with a drug dealer, and her father is an alcoholic who abandoned his family - though he, at least, cleaned up his act later in life.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: She really has a thing for pursuing old cases and bringing justice where everyone else considers it impossible, to the point of investigating cases that are 80 or 90 years old just because some distant descendant of the victim asks her to.

Detective Scotty Valens

Played By: Danny Pino

• The Charmer: Scotty is cocky but chivalrous, and always ready to flirt with an attractive woman - though his affairs often get him in trouble.
• Good Is Not Nice: He cares about justice and doing his job as much as the others, but it doesn't stop him from coming off as arrogant, combative or downright insensitive when it comes to dealing with suspects, witnesses or even victims and their families themselves. One episode had him questioning why a Wholesome Crossdresser service veteran who was repeatedly attacked for his persona doesn't just stop acting that way, only for the man to reply back, "And you're a detective?"
• Hot-Blooded: Scotty's temper is his probably his Fatal Flaw and has landed him in plenty of trouble. He is easily angered and provoked, especially when some of his personal issues (like mental illness) or women are concerned, leading to a number of violent outbursts.
• Idiot Ball: In "Breaking News", when he learns that Frankie has lied to him about being divorced and that she's still married. He is disgusted but when he meets her later in a bar he goes to play bed bondage with her... in the middle of a crime investigation.
• Jerkass Ball: Usually alternated between him and Vera, although other squad members have been known to hold it on rare occasions.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: A particularly noteworthy case is Offender, where he unwittingly gives Mitch Hathaway the information he needs to deduce the identity of his son's killer. This leads to Hathaway nearly killing the murderer, and is one of the things Internal Affairs uses against Scotty during the first half of season 5.
• Non-Idle Rich: Discussed. In "The Hitchhiker", he says he won't retire even if he wins the lottery.
• Writer on Board: Danny Pino wrote the episode "Stealing Home", which shows both the actor's love for baseball and his hatred of the Castro dictatorship. It is a Scotty-centered episode.

Detective Nick Vera

"You don't mind a little dirt, do you, Rush?"

Played By: Jeremy Ratchford

• Cop/Criminal Family: When looking for suspects in an old police ledger he says: "South Philly thugs. I probably have relatives in this book."
• Fat Idiot: Subverted. His appearance, and general attitude give this impression of a bumbling overweight guy, but he's actually a good detective. He once figured out that a seemingly random sequence of letters and numbers was a periodical number. Another time he cracked a case by noticing the color of the victim's luggage.
• Formerly Fit: A flashback to his rookie year showed that he was once in very good shape.
• Gentle Giant: Despite being snarky, he's amazingly good with children and as Rush tells a rape victim: "He only looks like a Neanderthal."
• Heroic BSoD: In "Flashover", after realizing he had arrested wrong man who subsequently died in prison. This ends with him giving up his badge.
• Hidden Depths: Loves musicals. Can't sing, though. Also speaks Russian, though he admits he's not exactly fluent.
• Hollywood Tone-Deaf: Implied at the end of "Wilkommen", when his singing causes everybody around to cover their ears. And he claims to have played Danny Zuko in a Grease play in high school...
• Maybe Ever After: At the end of season 7 he is shown getting closer with his Old Flame Megan, possibly rekindling their relationship.
• Noodle Incident: His "woulda had a 19 year old" with Megan now, mentioned in "Ravaged".
• What the Hell, Hero?: Any time he uses violence to force a suspect to confess.

Detective Will Jeffries

Played By: Thom Barry

• Berserk Button: Punches Danner when he not only finds evidence that the main Danner railroaded was innocent, but also sees Danner smarmily try to justify his actions.
• Butt-Monkey: If there was one teammate who could qualify as this, it's him. Played for Drama against suspects, who aren't ashamed to act racist towards him (in fact, the only other squad member who gets as much crap from suspects is Lilly herself, being a woman), but Played for Laughs among his fellow detectives, especially since he usually takes it in stride.
• Cool Old Guy: He is sixty... something, but when he loses his temper (and that's hard), he loses it, as that ADA learned in "Death Penalty: Final Appeal."
• Embarrassing Old Photo: Vera finds a photo of him at his high school prom and distributes copies of it at the station to prove the "hottie" that accompanied Jeffries and whom he has bragged so much about wasn't hot at all. Jeffries then counterattacks distributing copies of Vera's prom, but Vera is delighted if anything.
• Genius Bruiser: Former football player and boxer. Aspiring writer (once he retires) with quite more culture than his teammates.
• Gentle Giant: He's the tallest and brawniest of the men on the squad, but is also the kindest and least prone to anger and violence.
• Mangst: For his wife, who was run over by a truck in the 90s. He got better after confronting, and ultimately forgiving, the man who accidentally killed her.
• Number Two: To Stillman. He is placed in command when Stillman is temporarily suspended.
• One True Love: Married his high-school sweetheart, Mary. She was killed in a hit and run in 1995 while changing a tire on the road.
• Writers Cannot Do Math: In "Strange Fruit", he is shown to be 12 in 1963 but in “Best Friends” (aired in 2005), it's his 60th birthday. Lampshaded in "November 22nd":
  Will: [talking about the day Kennedy was assassinated] I was playing touch football at recess.
  Scotty: Recess? I thought you were, like, forty-five when that happened.
  Lilly: No, you're thinking of when Lincoln was shot.
  Will: Keep it up. See what happens.

Lieutenant John Stillman

Played By: John Finn

• Cool Old Guy: Is not ashamed of calling out criminals and other witnesses when he needs to and is progressive and supportive.
• Da Chief: The lead of the Cold Case unit (most of the time).
• The Stoic: He is easily the most even-tempered member of Philly's cold case squad.
• 10-Minute Retirement: Took a forced leave in place of Scotty in season 5 but helped the squad extra-officially anyway.

Detective Kat Miller

Played By: Tracie Thoms

• Embarrassing Old Photo: She shows one to Vera at the end of "Stand Up and Holler."
• Sassy Black Woman: Especially in her scenes with Vera.
• Sixth Ranger: Is also the latest to join the Cold Case unit, although she then becomes a fully fledged member.
• Tomboy: She describes her young self as one in “Wednesday Women”.
• Two Girls to a Team: With Lilly.

Law Enforcement

Deputy Commissioner Patrick Doherty

Played By: Keith Szarabajka

• Character Development: It's eventually revealed that the reason he's such a hardass in regards to John is because he was the one who sent his drug addicted son to prison for a series of petty crimes. He comes to reluctantly admit to John that his son going to prison was the best thing that ever happened to him, as it helped him get his life back on track.
• Dirty Cop: He was a known associate of various crooked city officials (including the killer in "Jurisprudence") from his first appearance, but isn't revealed to personally be dirty until the Grand Finale, where it transpires that he covered up a manslaughter committed by his son.
• Obstructive Bureaucrat: In "Street Money" and "Jurisprudence".

Frankie Rafferty

Played By: Tania Raymonde

• Enhance Button: Most of her job as a Video Lab Tech.
• The Unfair Sex: Thinks it is OK to lie to Scotty about her marriage and cheat on her husband because they are going to divorce anyway (the guy doesn't seem to be aware of the last part, though).

ADA Curtis Bell

Played By: Jonathan LaPaglia

Agent Diane Yates

Played By: Susanna Thompson

• Best Served Cold: The entire point of her career is to find who killed her boyfriend when she was 18 and kill the murderer herself.
• Blood-Splattered Innocents: Her high school boyfriend was murdered right in front of her, his body fell on her while she was in the backseat of his convertible, and she is shown covered in his blood.
• Cowboy Cop: She uses her position as an FBI agent and her former relationship with Stillman to make the PPD re-open her One Case and help her investigate it. As it turns out, she's doing so completely on her own, but her supervisor has to suck it up and let her continue the investigation because his position would be the most threatened if the whole thing was uncovered.
• If You Kill Him, You Will Be Just Like Him!: Lilly manages to convince her to not kill her boyfriend's murderer when she has him handcuffed, though interestingly she does so without using these exact words
• New Old Flame: To Stillman. She admits to Lilly that she broke up his marriage, and by the end of the series they have rekindled their relationship.
• No Woman's Land: She claims the PPD was this when she left for the FBI.
• The Reveal: She is the young woman seen in the Drive In at the beginning of her first episode

Detective Chris Lassing

Played By Justin Chambers

• We Hardly Knew Ye: He's transferred after four episodes due to his diabetes as well as deciding to become a doctor in Seattle.

Detective Josie Sutton

Played By Sarah Brown

• Dislikes the New Guy: Played with: while the rest of the squad is cordial, if not a little distant, from her, Detective Vera is outright hostile to her, even implying that she rose through the ranks due to her good looks.
• Naïve Newcomer: She is unprepared for the emotional toll that the division takes on her, and leaves the squad prematurely as a result.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: She's gone only five episodes into season three, being unable to handle both the job and Vera's harassment.

Family & Friends

Ellen Rush

Played By: Meredith Baxter

• Addiction Displacement: Tried coffee during the short period she actually stopped drinking alcohol.
• Bus Crash: A disputed case. While she wasn't exactly Put on a Bus, her death was off-screen and her funeral never showed up on the series.
• Dying Alone: Her main fear. She's so obsessed with it that she marries four times in her lifetime. Ultimately happens, as her last husband leaves her, her younger daughter is nowhere to be found and her older daughter is always working.
• Killed Off for Real: Is hospitalized and then dies of cirrhosis of the liver due to her prolonged alcoholism.
• Never My Fault: She was the one who sent Lilly out to buy her beer late at night as a child which caused her to be assaulted, but she then claims that Lilly went out under her own volition.
• Off the Wagon: Ultimately leading to her death.

Christina Rush

Played By: Nicki Aycox

Mike Valens

Played By: Nestor Carbonell

Paul Cooper

Played By: Raymond J. Barry