Who is Jackie Laverty in Line of Duty? Why does her name keep cropping up?!
Well, Jackie Laverty is a character from Line of Duty’s very first season, but her name has just come up once again in season 6, episode 3.
If you’re keeping up with the latest season of Line of Duty, you might have noticed more than a couple of throwbacks to earlier seasons of the hit crime thriller. Jackie Laverty only appeared in the first season, but her disappearance has been brought up multiple times over the show's run.
With the return of Ryan Pilkington and a cheeky background throwback to season five, Jed Mercurio is proving that you need to know everything from past seasons to keep up with the twists and turns of his drama.
So, if you were struggling to remember who Jackie Laverty was, look no further!
Who is Jackie Laverty?
Jackie Laverty was a successful businesswoman, and one of the major criminals in Line of Duty season 1. At some point, before the show began, Jackie became a criminal associate of Tommy Hunter, one of the key members of the Organised Crime Group (OCG), and began using her many businesses to launder money for the criminal gang.
Jackie reveals to DCI Tony Gates that she drove home drunk from a work function, and was involved in a hit and run where she thinks she killed a dog. She calls Tony to her home and explains that she reported her car stolen because she was scared the police would find out. Tony stages a break-in at Jackie’s home to make it appear as if her car was really stolen after all.
At TO-20 (Tony’s department), DS Dot Cottan lays out the new cases, and Tony learns that the “dog” Jackie killed was actually a person. Tony demands that Jackie confesses to the crime, but she only reports that she was to blame for the hit and run.
The body is later identified as Gurjit Patel, an accountant who works for Jackie Laverty herself. Tony attempts to delete his missing persons' report, but DS Steve Arnott (Martin Compston) manages to spot it just in time!
Steve attempts to uncover Jackie’s criminal activites. Meanwhile, Tony goes to confront Jackie over Gurjit’s death, where he figures out that he had realised Jackie was laundering money and must have threatened to go to the police. He arrests her, but Jackie begs him to release her whilst they drive to the police station. He relents and takes her home, where she seduces him.
Suddenly, members of the OCG breaks into her home and knocks Tony out. Then, they murder Jackie and place Tony’s fingerprints on the murder weapon.
What happened to Jackie Laverty’s body?
Jackie’s body is taken from the crime scene stored in a freezer by the killers. The OCG kidnaps Tony, taking him to a warehouse where they show him her body. The criminals tell him he must stay quiet, or they will hand over the murder weapon to the police, successfully framing him as the killer.
Later, they move Jackie to Terry Boyle’s flat, depositing her body in his freezer. Tony attempts to go back to the warehouse to retrieve her body, but it is obviously no longer there. For the rest of the season, the OCG use Jackie’s body to blackmail Tony into working for the OCG, including luring Steve to the warehouse where they almost kill him!
In Line of Duty season 5, we learned that Jackie’s body was still in Terry Boyle’s freezer, where it had stayed since 2012. Ryan Pilkington and a couple of other OCG members dumped parts of Jackie’s frozen remains along with John Corbett’s body at a junkyard, where the bodies are finally discovered by the police.
Why was Jackie Laverty mentioned in Line of Duty season 6?
When police went to raid Terry Boyle’s flat in Line of Duty season 6, they found that his flat was suspiciously clean, and that his freezer had been ripped out of the wall. In episode three of season 6, AC-12 are notified that a freezer has turned up at a random scrapyard.
When the freezer was analysed by the forensics team, they found a blood deposit which was a 99.9% match for none other than Jackie Laverty, finally connecting the dots on her disappearance way back in 2012!
Who played Jackie Laverty?
Jackie Laverty was played by Gina McKee.Gina has been acting since 1988 and has appeared in a range of shows and movies including Notting Hill. Her recent appearances include roles in Bodyguard, Black Narcissus, Phantom Thread and The Rook.
