Who was Harper Dearing on NCIS? Everything to know

Harper Dearing was an antagonist on NCIS during its ninth and tenth seasons. Played by Richard Schiff, he first appeared in May 2012 and was killed by Gibbs in September of the same year. Dearing was involved in the firebombing of Navy ships as revenge for his son’s death in a ship accident involving defective cabling. Despite having an emotional reason behind his crimes, Dearing stands as one of the most remembered villains of the show.

While Harper Dearing exited NCIS in season 10, the series is currently in its season 23. As of the writing of this article, the show has already aired its fifth episode of the season. The recent storyline of season 23 episode 5, titled Now and Then, connected a time span of three decades as a past crime of the 1990s was finally solved by the team. 

The episode also witnessed the return of Roma Maffia as Vera, while Bobby Moynihan and Ely Henry played the elderly versions of their characters in NCIS: Origins. The episode also observed a crossover with Origins as the two shows covered the same crime spanning 30 years. The crossover event saw a brief cameo of Mark Harmon’s Gibbs in his retirement home.

NCIS: A glimpse at Harper Dearing’s character

Richard Schiff’s Harper Dearing was introduced on NCIS season 9 episode 22, Playing with Fire. Introduced as an eccentric businessman, Dearing was the CEO of a venture capital group named Dorado Hills Investment. Following the tragic event of his son’s death, Dearing turned into a villain and started targeting Navy ships. Since his son had died due to faulty wiring in one of the ships, Dearing wanted to highlight the dangers of bad cabling.

He had hired Andre Fullerton to plant the Navy ships with explosives. However, Fullerton was captured by the NCIS team and he revealed his client’s identity. Since Dearing had stopped coming to his office for a year before his terrorism, Gibbs’ team could not get him from his workplace. As such, Gibbs strategized tracking the terrorist.

The next episode, titled Up in Smoke, found Harper Dearing one step ahead of the law enforcers when they discovered a bug on probationary officer Ned Dorneget. Moreover, he hacked the MTAC system to talk to Gibbs. Besides buying one of the chips of Phantom Eight, Dearing also kidnapped Director Vance.

In the following episode, Till Death Do Us Part, the last episode of NCIS season 9, revealed that Dearing was not interested in Vance but needed his car. Dearing placed a bomb in Vance’s car that went off later in the episode.

The first episode of NCIS season 10, titled Extreme Prejudice, showed the President of the United States asking the FBI and NCIS to deal with Dearing with extreme prejudice, a term used for a kill order. As a nationwide hunt for Dearing started, the criminal pretended to have committed suicide. However, a suspicious Gibbs took DNA tests to prove that Dearing’s brother, Lawrence, was dead. 

After talking to Lawrence’s wife, Gibbs realized that Dearing would be in the family home where Evan was raised, to hold on to his son’s memories. As such, Gibbs confronted Dearing in his hideout. After an altercation, Dearing went for the gun he had hidden in his home. However, Gibbs killed the terrorist with a knife.

A glimpse at Richard Schiff’s career

Maryland-born actor Richard Schiff started his career as a director on Broadway. He later moved on to acting. Some of the movies where Schiff played a notable part are Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Clemency, Geostorm, American Fable, Entourage, The Gambler, Man of Steel, Johnny English Reborn, The Infidel, Solitary Man and many more.

Some of Schiff’s television projects include The West Wing, Ballers, Rogue, Murder in the First, The Good Doctor, The Affair, Counterpart, House of Lies, Relativity and many more.

NCIS airs on CBS every Tuesday for interested viewers.