Benjamin David Merva (born David James Merva), also known as The Messiah and The Strangler, is the main antagonist of the Criminal Minds episodes "Believers" and "300".
Merva is a ritualistic serial killer and the leader of a cult split from the former sect led by the deceased Benjamin Cyrus, escalating the cult's crimes directly at infiltrating and _targeting federal law enforcement.
He was portrayed by Michael Hogan, who also portrayed General Tullius in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Slade Wilson in Smallville and Gerard Argent in Teen Wolf.
Biography
Early Crimes
Merva was part of Cyrus' Separatarian Sect until the cult was sieged by federal and state police in 2008, placing Merva and other survivors in Witness Protection. As Cyrus was shot dead and another one of the cult's followers detonated explosives on the compound, killing several members and law enforcement, Merva and other members sought revenge against federal law enforcement and hatched a plan with a new cult they formed, The Believers.
Former child bride Mary Meadows became an FBI agent to infiltrate headquarters in Quantico, and new recruit Jerry Holston worked with his wife Donna to kidnap victims for ritualistic sacrifices for the cult's prophecy. All members burned their prints in chlorine as an initiation into their ranks.
Merva killed various random people across the Continental U.S. by cutting out their hyoid bones, then choking them to death with his bare hands. They'd be dispersed all over the country where they were last seen alive, Meadows wiping the crimes from FBI databases to eliminate a trail. The hyoid bones would be kept by Merva or in the Holstons' storage unit. Agent Owen Quinn, who nicknamed the killer "The Strangler", tracked seven murders and sought to investigate them on his own, in spite of the killings ranging as high as 299 people.
The Holstons held Quinn captive, tortured him by burning his prints, and interrogated him daily for information. Their son Theo always was aware of the cult and was reluctantly complicit with several crimes, but he pitied Quinn and decided to help him escape a year later. Theo locked Quinn in the family storage unit and sent an email to Agent Spencer Reid to provide the address and coordinates. Quinn was rescued and questioned, found credible in spite of his paranoia and PTSD.
In Criminal Minds
Theo escaped with his girlfriend once his parents realized his actions. After he killed two members trying to kidnap him, the BAU agents tracked him and his girlfriend to the cabin they were hiding in, revealing the cult and what it was behind. Merva was tracked and arrested at his warehouse hideout after initiating another recruit, but Meadows, who kept tabs on the agents and made sure they didn't recognize her, was one step ahead. She and her followers held Penelope Garcia captive, shooting Quinn and nearly killing him to stop him from intervening.
As Agent Spencer Reid was the final sacrifice arranged, she held him at gunpoint and showed Garcia captive, saying she'd die if he didn't comply. Reid reluctantly agreed and allowed Meadows to retrieve Merva, fingerspelling "Ben's Believers" to the security camera so the team realize they were split from Cyrus' sect. Agent Emily Prentiss finally remembered Meadows, and they traced her activities in hacking the databases. The agents stormed the warehouse where the cult was preparing their final ritual, but they fled and left a murdered Theo behind. As Reid was restrained at the altar around all the other victims' hyoid bones, which were retrieved from evidence with Merva, Merva proclaims his final murder to complete his prophecy. The agents snatched and arrested armed guard, until they startled the cult by shooting one. From there, gunfire broke out against the armed members firing back, and when Merva made a move to kill Reid, Prentiss shouted at him by name and shot him dead. The cult was devastated, and all heavily complicit members in the conspiracy were arrested, the rest who were merely indoctrinated likely deprogrammed and placed in witness protection.
Trivia
- Merva is inspired by multiple real-life serial killers:
- Carl Eugene Watts, a.k.a. "The Saturday Night Slasher", an American nationwide serial killer suspected of 200 women's torture-murders, was caught when one woman escaped and the other woman was rescued, and was at risk of being released before an additional murder conviction sealed his fate to prison.
- Dyonathan Celestrino, a.k.a. "The Cross Maniac", a Brazilian serial killer and cult leader responsible for ritualistic strangulations of numerous people he found undesirable, arrested with his complicit cult members when he was identified.
- Gilles de Rais, a.k.a. "The Original Bluebeard", a French knight under command of Joan of Arc and one of the oldest reported serial killers, responsible for hundreds of physical and sexual torture-murders of children his accomplices kidnapped, burying them in graves on his property and only being caught when he killed a cleric. In spite of a belief a panic was made as a conspiracy against him, de Rais was hanged for his convictions.
- Mary Laney, the main hidden antagonist of the James Patterson novel "Invisible" in the Emma Dockery series; a forensically sophisticated and long-undetected nationwide serial torture-murderer of various people, including the sister of the main character, an FBI agent who wasn't originally believed when she tracked Laney's crimes.
- Merva is also inspired by multiple real-life cult leaders:
- Marshall Applewhite, a.k.a. "Do", the leader of Heaven's Gate, a UFO cult practicing in self-mutilation and committing a mass suicide under false prophecy.
- David Koresh, the leader of the Branch Dividians, a cult in Waco, Texas practicing child marriage that got into standoffs and shootouts with members during the Waco siege, where the compound was set on fire mostly likely by the cult, resulting in dozens of members' deaths, including Koresh.
- Jim Jones, the leader of the People's Temple and the related Jonestown commune, where the members were armed with assault rifles, the cult members were tortured, they _targeted federal employees, and the hundreds of followers in the commune killed themselves and each other in the Jonestown massacre to evade arrest.
- Randy Weaver, the leader of his own cult within his family who stockpiled weapons and believed in a biblical apocalypse, eventually getting in a shootout with FBI and ATF agents that killed many of relatives in the Ruby Ridge siege.
