David Rossi

David Stephen Rossi is a fictional character in the CBS crime drama Criminal Minds, portrayed by Joe Mantegna.

He is also portrayed as a younger man by Robert Dunne, in flashbacks as a Marine infantry private in Vietnam in 1969 and in his earlier years with the BAU in 1978.

Rossi begins the series returning to the FBI after a lengthy period of being semi-retired, with his return due to "unfinished business".

He is shown to be a close friend and colleague of Aaron Hotchner (Thomas Gibson), as they worked together during the early days of the Behavioral Analysis Unit.

Rossi is also a writer and one of the team's senior and most decorated profilers.

He replaced Jason Gideon, who was written out following Mandy Patinkin's abrupt departure from the series.

Mantegna has stated in an interview that the character was named after one of the policemen who had testified at the O. J. Simpson trial.

Rossi's middle name, Stephen, is revealed in a flashback near the end of the tenth season episode, "Nelson's Sparrow".

Rossi was born and raised on Long Island, New York, in the town of Commack.

As a child, he was friends with a young Emma Taylor, whom he refers to as the "one who got away".

He was also close with Ray Finnegan (William Sadler), who eventually grew up to be a prominent local mobster.

Rossi, however, avoided the lure of organized crime, and enlisted in the Marine Corps.

He also admits in season 9, while interrogating a suspect, that when he was a teenager, he stuffed a Black teammate on his baseball team into a locker and urinated on him because of peer pressure from his other, white teammates.

He says he has felt ashamed of it ever since, and that he considers it the worst thing he ever did.

Details of his military service are sketchy, as Rossi rarely talks about it.

He served in the Vietnam War and rose to the rank of sergeant major before retiring from the Marine Corps; based on the backstory timelines, specifically the time in service required to rise to the rank of sergeant major and retire, he presumably served in the Marine Corps Reserve after joining the FBI.

In the Season 8 episode "The Fallen", Rossi encounters his old unit commander, Sgt. Harrison Scott (Meshach Taylor), who has since become a homeless alcoholic living on the streets of Santa Monica, California.

Through flashbacks, it is shown that Scott had saved Rossi's life in Vietnam when Rossi froze at an oncoming Viet Cong soldier.

It is implied that they both served in the 1st Marine Division.

After being discharged from active duty, he was recruited by the FBI.

He is a Supervisory Special Agent in the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit, and has appeared from the episode "About Face", which was originally broadcast on October 31, 2007, during the show's third season.

He subsequently cut most ties with his former life, not even returning to Commack for Emma's funeral in early 2009.

Rossi has had an illustrious FBI career and enjoys a sterling reputation, even outside the BAU confines.

He claims to have "written the book" on hostage negotiation, and in one episode steps in as a negotiator when his fellow agents Spencer Reid (Matthew Gray Gubler) and Emily Prentiss (Paget Brewster) are being held hostage.

He takes an annual leave to do cross-country lecture and book-signing tours, which apparently attract a lot of female fans, "if Barry Manilow isn't in town."

He had worked with Hotchner prior to his initial retirement from the Bureau.

To date Rossi has been married three times, but he has said the only people he knows how to make happy are "divorce lawyers".

In season seven, he reconnects with his first wife, Carolyn (Isabella Hofmann), who tells him she is dying of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and asks him to help her end her suffering.

After some deliberation, he tells her he cannot bring himself to help her commit suicide, only to find that she has already taken an overdose of her medication.

As she dies in his arms, she asks, "Do you think he'll be there?"

Rossi replies, "I know he will."

At the end of the episode, the "he" in question is revealed to be their son James, who died moments after being born, and whom Rossi buries her next to.

In season 9, it is revealed that his second wife, Hayden Montgomery (Sheryl Lee Ralph), is African American, and later in season 10 he discovers she was pregnant when they divorced, and that he has a daughter, Joy (Amber Stevens), and a grandson.

Rossi has a romantic relationship with BAU Bureau Chief Erin Strauss (Jayne Atkinson), hinted at throughout the series starting late in season 7.

The full details of the affair are never disclosed, but he reveals his feelings for her when she is murdered by serial killer John Curtis (Mark Hamill), aka "The Replicator"; upon learning of her death, the usually unflappable Rossi becomes deeply emotional.

At the end of the season, he kills Curtis to save his fellow agents' lives, thus avenging Strauss' murder.

Despite growing up on Long Island, Rossi is apparently a Chicago Cubs fan, judging by the Cubs gear in his Quantico office.

It is hinted that he plays video games, as BAU Technical Analyst Penelope Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness) mentions a report of an abducted child named "Niko Bellic", who Rossi points out to be a character from Grand Theft Auto IV.

Also, in a season 8 episode, Rossi shows familiarity with the game "Gods of Combat", a fictionalized PC game which corrupts the minds of several young murder suspects.

In contrast to Hotchner and Gideon, Rossi is decisively extroverted, abrasive, and much less cerebral, though still highly intelligent and disciplined.