Throughout its 23-season run, NCIS has killed off a handful of beloved characters, including very recently on the 2026 TV schedule with NCIS Director Leon Vance. Of course, with a show like NCIS that puts characters in danger on a daily basis, it can be expected. But for one former cast member, there’s one death that certainly rocked them back in the day.
Mark Harmon and retired NCIS Special Agent Leon Carroll Jr., who served as a technical advisor on NCIS, were guests on the latest episode of the official podcast, NCIS: Partners & Probies, hosted by stars Brian Dietzen and Diona Reasonover. The duo, whose new book Ghosts of Sicily is out now, got into the nitty-gritty of the series and their collaboration. At one point, Harmon was praising Carroll, and it was brought up that Leon Vance is his namesake, who was killed off along with his wife, Jackie. Jackie, played by Paula Newsome, was killed off back in Season 10, and evidently, the news was pretty hard to take in:
I didn’t let her know that that was gonna happen. And Chris [Waild] was the writer on that, and every time she sees him, he hears about killing off Jackie.
Jackie’s death was a heartbreaking one. It happened during a targeted drive-by shooting at her home, meant for Ziva’s dad, Mossad Director Eli David, who also eventually died in the shootout. While Newsome only appeared in four episodes of the series, her death definitely changed Vance moving forward. And when he died during the 500th episode, she was the one to welcome him to Heaven in an emotional moment. Newsome didn’t appear on screen, but Vance could hear her, making it all the more tearjerking.
It’s not surprising that the death made a big impact, not just on-screen. It was certainly unexpected, and it sounds like after all these years, it’s still weighing heavily on some. Even Harmon felt the need to say “It’s a TV show,” but it just proves how impactful a death can be, no matter how long a character is on-screen for. Now that Vance is also dead, it can be assumed Jackie won’t be making any reappearances, but since it is NCIS, nothing is predictable.
Of course, Newsome may have been killed off of NCIS pretty prematurely, but she still nabbed plenty of roles post-NCIS. She even returned to CBS in 2019 for an episode of Magnum P.I. and again in 2021 when she landed the series regular role of Maxine Roby in CSI: Vegas, which ended in 2024 after three seasons. It’s hard to picture what would have been different had NCIS not killed off Jackie, or at least waited to kill her off, but unfortunately, we’ll never know.
With NCIS returning for Season 24 this fall, fans may have to prepare themselves for even more deaths, or at the very least, some more near-death experiences. But that’s what makes NCIS entertaining and why it’s still on after over 20 years. New episodes air on Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on CBS, streaming the next day with a Paramount+ subscription.
