George Barnfather

George Barnfather
First appearance	"Ghost of a Chance"
Last appearance	"Self Defense"
Created by	Tom Fontana
Portrayed by	Clayton LeBouef
Information
Gender	Male

George Barnfather is a fictional Deputy Commissioner in the Baltimore Police Department on Homicide: Life on the Street, played by Clayton LeBouef.

Barnfather first appeared in the series as a Captain whose command was over the Homicide Section. He was then promoted to Colonel and was often the mediator between the Homicide Section Shift Commanders and the Deputy Commissioner of Operations. A career oriented college educated officer and bureaucrat, he often disagreed with Homicide Shift Commander (Lieutenant) Al Giardello ("Gee") whom the Deputy Commissioner James C. Harris saw as a renegade in terms of valuing the department's objectives and chain of command. On one occasion, Barnfather enraged Gee when he prohibited Steve Crosetti from having a funeral honor guard because of Crosetti's suicide. Because of this, Barnfather advances in the department much more quickly than Giardello, despite Gee's greater experience, age, and time in the department (Barnfather is at least 10 years younger than Gee). His concerns were primarily political in nature, which was a cause of constant friction between him and Gee, whose top priority was always supporting the detectives under his command.

Barnfather demoted Megan Russert three ranks from Captain to Detective after he strongly disagreed with her handling of the Hangman Sniper case. Throughout the series, Barnfather comes to disagree with actions undertaken by Harris, and he says he can no longer look away from the truth about Harris after the siege on, and mass suicide of, a black militant group led by Harris' one time partner Burundi Robinson. His relationship with Gee then improves as Harris' days as Deputy Ops become numbered, and he was generally more supportive of Gee and the Homicide Unit in Seasons 6 and 7, and rarely pressured Gee to bring results on unreasonable time frames (or, when he was pushing for an immediate arrest of Georgia Rae Mahoney after the office shootout near the end of Season 6, his urgency was reasonable).