Agent Dan Erickson

Cowan (subordinate colleague)

Mark Hoffman (enemy and killer)

"*Now everything we know, you know.*"
―Erickson offers to Mark Hoffman, way before his betrayal.
**Supervisory Special Agent Dan Erickson** is a fictional character from the *Saw* franchise as well as a supporting protagonist in *Saw V* and *VI*. He was portrayed by Mark Rolston.

## Biography

### The Jigsaw Case

Dan Erickson was a special agent working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the supervisor of Special Agent Peter Strahm and Special Agent Lindsey Perez. At one point during their career, Strahm and Perez investigated the case of serial killer John Kramer, better known as the Jigsaw Killer. During their investigation, both John and his accomplice, Amanda Young, died at the hands of Jeff Denlon, one of their victims. However, John had previously targeted both of the agents as well, resulting in both of them being severely injured. Even though Jigsaw and Amanda were dead, the agents had suspected that there must have been another, yet unknown, accomplice. In order to insure her safety, Erickson visited Perez at the Saint Eustace Hospital and helped her to fake her death and go into hiding until the unknown accomplice would be identified. (*Saw IV*, *VI*)

After Strahm was informed of her supposed death, Erickson visited him in his room as he had been taken to the same hospital after having been injured in a trap at the same night as Perez. Erickson criticized him as Strahm had invaded Jigsaw's hideout, the abandoned Gideon Meatpacking Plant at 11235 Blake Drive, without waiting for the reinforcements. Nonetheless, Strahm told him that he wanted to interrogate John Kramer's ex-wife, Jill Tuck, one more time. Erickson however dismissed his request and informed him that over a dozen dead victims had been found at the plant, including two cops, Detective Eric Matthews and Officer Daniel Rigg. Strahm tried to defend himself by claiming that many lives had been saved by him as Jigsaw was dead. Erickson however told him that he was off the case on his orders and eventually left the hospital.

Following his discharge, Strahm decided to continue his investigation on his own and released himself from the hospital. After that, he went to the local FBI headquarters. Unnoticed by Erickson, he entered the research lab to look for information about Hoffman in the international criminal database. When he left again, he crossed Erickson's path when the latter left his office. When the latter asked him what he was doing here, Strahm claimed that he followed Erickson's orders to take some time off and only wanted to get some things from his office. Despite his suspicious behavior, Erickson let him go.

Later that night, Strahm returned to the research lab once more. Unknown to him, Erickson noticed his presence when he left again. However, he was able to leave the building before his supervisor caught up with him. Eventually, Erickson called Detective Mark Hoffman, who had tried to call him earlier that evening. During their conversation, Hoffman told Erickson about Strahm's theory about a second accomplice of Jigsaw besides Amanda Young and asked him if Strahm had told him about it, which Erickson denied. When he asked who Strahm suspected in his theory, Hoffman said that Strahm suspected an insider with access to information about the investigation, but kept back the fact that he himself was the suspect. Erickson then ended the call and offered Hoffman to further discuss the situation the next day, which Hoffman accepted. As his suspicion of Strahm increased, Erickson went to the research lab and thereby discovered that the files of potential Jigsaw victims were missing.

Shortly afterwards, Erickson returned to his own office where he was visited by Jill Tuck who wanted to talk to him. Once they were alone, Jill told Erickson that she believed to be observed by someone from the FBI. When Erickson wanted to know who she suspected, she told him that it was the agent who interrogated her earlier. Realizing that she was talking about Strahm, he asked her if she had told anyone else about this, which Jill denied. After their conversation, Jill left the headquarters. (*Saw V*)

### False Trail

Only minutes later, Erickson finally finished work and went to his car. Unknown to him, he was observed by Hoffman who still sat in his own car on the other side of the parking lot. He used Strahm's mobile from the evidence room to call Erickson, but immediately hung up when Erickson answered it. Confused by this, Erickson immediately tried to call him back. Hoffman then rejected the call and turned off the phone. Therefore, Erickson became even more suspicious and ordered Special Agent Cowan to put a trace on Strahm's phone. Eventually, the phone was turned on again, enabling Cowan to find its location in an underground catacomb area at 1293 Sandburst Drive. Therefore, she informed Erickson about the address.

Erickson immediately drove to the location and entered the building. Thereby, he found a stairway. Armed with his weapon, he carefully went downstairs and discovered an underground surveillance room. Upon taking a look at a set of monitors, he realized that they showed live footage of another Jigsaw game. Besides this, he found a miniature model used to visualize the game, as well as several photos of the five victims hanging on a wall before him. Additionally, he noticed a steaming cup of coffee which was still hot, telling him that whoever occupied this room had been here not long ago. Suddenly, he heard a tortured groaning which attracted his attention. When he went into the direction from where the noise came, he was scared witless when he saw a woman, Brit Stevenson, who was armed with a hook, and aimed his gun at her, yelling at her to drop the hook, which she subsequently did. However, seconds later Erickson realized that Brit didn't want to attack him but was in fact one of the severely injured victims.

When he asked her who did this to her, she was too dazed to respond and just muttered that they had won before she passed out. Erickson immediately called for an ambulance before he went to the next room where he saw another victim, Mallick Scott, on the floor. Shortly afterwards, the paramedics arrived and were able to stabilize them to take them to the hospital. Afterwards, Erickson examined the surveillance room again and thereby found several files with more photos of the victims. Alerted by this, he tried to call Strahm and was shocked when he realized that Strahm's mobile phone lay on the desk right before him. Seconds later, he eventually discovered a FBI file with the photos of himself. Believing that Strahm was actually the one behind the new Jigsaw game, Erickson called Agent Cowan and ordered her to put out an APB on him. (*Saw V*)

Strahm however was killed in one of Hoffman's traps at the same time. Within the next days, Erickson found out that the five latest victims, Brit, Mallick, Ashley Kazon, Charles Salomon and Luba Gibbs, were all in some way involved in a severe case of arson which which had cost the lives of eight people. This case was previously investigated by Strahm and Perez. However, the investigation was ceased when the only witness suddenly disappeared, leading Erickson to the conclusion that Strahm had chosen them for his game to take revenge on them for escaping justice. (*Saw IV*, *VI*)

### Cooperation

Shortly afterwards, Eddie, the victim of another game, was found. Upon the investigation of the crime scene, fingerprints were found which were soon identified as those of Agent Strahm. Therefore, Erickson and Perez decided to let Hoffman in on Perez' staged death. When Hoffman arrived at the crime scene, Erickson informed him about the fingerprints, voicing his surprise and dismay of Strahm being the key suspect. However, he also stated that they had prepared a surprise for Strahm on their own and led Hoffman to the next room. Hoffman was shocked, when he saw Lindsey Perez standing before him. Erickson revealed that they had staged her death in order to guarantee her safety until they knew more about Jigsaw's unknown apprentice. During their conversation, Perez informed Hoffman that she and Strahm had worked on the arson case connected the five victims of the traps found by Erickson in the catacombs. However, the charges were dropped when the only witness unexpectedly disappeared. This led them to the conclusion that Strahm had chosen them in order to take revenge. As they now believed to know that Strahm was the secret accomplice of Jigsaw, they asked Hoffman to work together. Hoffman initially hesitated as the agents hadn't informed him about Perez' faked death earlier, but ultimately accepted the offer when Erickson promised him to inform him about all future information and FBI activities regarding the Jigsaw Case. (*Saw VI*)

### Reopening the Seth Baxter Case

Soon afterwards, Dr. Adam Heffner, the police department's pathologist, called the agents and Hoffman to the morgue. Upon the obduction of Eddie, Heffner had discovered that a knife with a tined blade had been used to cut the jigsaw piece from Eddie's skin, while the pieces of most previous victims had been cut off with a plain scalpel. Upon comparing this case with other previous cases, the agents had found out that the tined blade had only been used once before, to cut the jigsaw piece from the body of Seth Baxter, the murderer of Hoffman's sister, Angelina Acomb. As a different knife had been used, Perez and Erickson had ordered to further analyze the video tape found at Seth's crime scene, thinking that it might have been recorded by someone else as well.

Later that day, Perez and Erickson received a laboratory report. According to this report, traces of Freon, more explicitly Dichlorodifluoromethane R-12, a chemical substance which wasn't produced anymore since 1994, had been found in Strahm's fingerprints. Furthermore, the uric acid levels and the eccrine gland residue of the fingerprints were inconsistent for an individual with an active epidural metabolism, leading to the conclusion that Strahm must've been dead already by the time his fingerprints were left at the crime scene. Therefore, Erickson called Hoffman to come to the FBI headquarters as soon as possible and thereby also informed him that the Seth Baxter tape had been found. Shortly after receiving the call, Hoffman arrived at the FBI headquarters, where he was greeted by Erickson and Perez, who informed him about the traces of Freon in Strahm's fingerprints.

In order to find out if the crime scene of the latest game was polluted or if Strahm's fingerprints were already contaminated with the substance before, Perez and Erickson planned to find out what was formerly produced in the building where Simone and Eddie's game had taken place. Erickson was then interrupted by a phone call from the FBI's technical lab. Hoffman asked Perez if there were any news about the Seth Baxter tape, which she confirmed. Despite the fact that the tape was in a bad state, they were able to authenticate that the voice on the tape wasn't John Kramer's voice. Therefore, they had sent the tape to the technical lab to rectify it so they could hear the original voice. When she told Hoffman about it, she realized that his stopwatch was running and asked if he was timing something, to which he responded that he did before receiving the call from Erickson. Moments later, Erickson told them that the original voice on the Seth Baxter tape was soon going to be decrypted and told Hoffman and Perez to accompany them to the external lab. (*Saw VI*)

## Death

The group reached the lab soon afterwards. When they came in, FBI technician Sachi was still working on the tape. As they had to wait some more time, Hoffman took a cup of coffee from the machine in the room. Noticing Hoffman's increasing nervousness, Perez tried to put him under pressure and began to discuss Strahm's motivation for helping Jigsaw and stated that she had never suspected him to be mentally unstable during the five years she had worked with him. Erickson, now also noticing Hoffman's nervous behavior, then talked about the possibility that Strahm had killed Seth Baxter to throw suspicion on Hoffman. However there was still some detail that didn't fit the picture and therefore he finally revealed to Hoffman, that Strahm, judging by the analysis of his fingerprints, must have already been dead by the time he left his prints at the crime scene of Simone and Eddie's game.

Seconds later, Sachi restored the tape, finally revealing the voice to be that of Mark Hoffman. However, before the agents could react, Hoffman quickly pulled out a knife from his pocket, slashed Erickson's jugular vein and threw his coffee in Perez's face. Then, he cut off the power and grabbed Sachi, who was shot in the back three times by Agent Perez as Hoffman used her as a human shield. Upon doing so, Hoffman was able to approach Perez and stabbed her multiple times in the abdomen with his knife. He then asked her who else knew about him, to which she responded with her dying breath that everyone knew about him. Calling it a lie, Hoffman stabbed her one final time, killing her in the process.

Following the massacre, Hoffman threw away his knife and ran out of the lab. Seconds later, he returned with the severed hand of Strahm, which he had kept in a cooling box in his car trunk, and a gas canister. He placed Strahm's fingerprints all around the room and also on Perez' gun as well as the screwdriver which he had used to cut off the power. Afterwards, he poured the gasoline all over the floor, the corpses and the technical instruments. When he approached Erickson, he briefly hesitated and smiled when he saw that the latter was still alive, before he poured the fuel over him as well. Then, Hoffman set the lab on fire before finally fleeing the scene. (*Saw VI*)

## Personality

Dan Erickson was a responsible FBI agent, always following the official instructions. Even though he mostly worked in his office, he was also experienced in the field work. As a supervisory special agent, he did everything he could to insure the safety of his subordinates in order to protect them from danger and occasionally from themselves. Most of the time, Erickson acted in a calm, polite and helpful way when speaking to others. However, despite his general sense of responsibility, he was also reckless at times, as seen when he put Hoffman under pressure in the lab, despite being suspicious of him being the Jigsaw killer, which subsequently led to his own death.

## Trivia

Agent Dan Erickson is played by Mark Rolston, who was **Private Mark Drake** in **Aliens.**