Did Dexter Kill Maria LaGuerta & How Does She Die?

One of the key characters of the entire Dexter series is Maria LaGuerta, who was the lead investigator of the murders that Dexter was doing during the original series. While LaGuerta was already dead in Dexter: New Blood, calls back to the events of the original series because a character named Angel Batista has been investigated LaGuerta’s death and pinpointed it to Dexter. But did Dexter really kill Maria LaGuerta?

It wasn’t Dexter who killed Maria LaGuerta. Even though Dexter was still involved with her death, it was his sister Debra who killed LaGuerta. This happened when LaGuerta was trying to convince Debra to kill Dexter, but the sister ended up killing Maria to protect her brother.

Even though Maria LaGuerta’s death happened way back in season 7, which was almost ten years ago, her death still has an impact on Dexter’s life in New Blood. That said, it is important to know who killed her and how she died so that we can connect some of the events that happened in New Blood to her death back in season 7.

Did Dexter Kill LaGuerta?

Fans were elated that the Dexter series was coming back with Dexter: New Blood, which explores Dexter’s life following the events that happened during the series’ original eight-season run. While not a lot of people were happy about how season 8 ended, New Blood seems to have steered the series towards the right direction and the right ending for Dexter.

One of the things we saw in Dexter: New Blood was Dexter finding out from Angel Batista, one of the characters from the first series, was that he has been investigating the murder of former Miami police captain Maria LaGuerta, who was one of the lead investigators the Bay Harbor Butcher, who we all know is Dexter.

Maria LaGuerta was one of the main characters during the first seven seasons of the original series because she was the one investigating the murders that Dexter was doing. She may be a polarizing character, but we all know that she was doing her job when it came to trying to catch the Bay Harbor Butcher until her death in season 7.

That said, Angel Batista pinpointed the murder of LaGuerta to Dexter and tried to drive him back to Miami to face charges there. However, Dexter ultimately escaped from Batista and continued on with his life in the town of Iron Lake until he ultimately met his end in the series finale. But was Dexter really the one responsible for Maria LaGuerta’s death?

While we do know that Dexter wanted to kill Maria LaGuerta and was actually planning to kill him, he was not the one directly responsible for her death. However, as you will understand, Dexter still had a hand in LaGuerta’s death, and that means that he isn’t totally innocent regarding the death of the former Miami police captain.

Who Killed LaGuerta?

As mentioned, Maria LaGuerta died during season 7, but it was not Dexter who was directly responsible for killing her. Still, he had a role to play in her death. Let’s look at what happened in season 7 for you to understand more about how LaGuerta died and who killed her.

One of the more important characters back in the original Dexter series was Debra Morgan, who was Dexter’s adoptive sister and a police detective working under Maria LaGuerta back in Miami. Initially, she didn’t see eye to eye with LaGuerta for different reasons, but their relationship eventually began to improve as the series went on. Still, Debra and Maria were inevitably going to clash due to one common denominator—Dexter.

When Dexter decided that it was time to kill Maria LaGuerta because she was too deep in her investigations regarding the Bay Harbor Butcher, Debra had to step in after learning that the police captain herself was going after her brother.

Debra found Dexter about to shoot an unconscious Maria LaGuerta, as she pleads her brother to put the gun down. When LaGuerta woke up, she now pleads with Debra to shoot her brother, as Dexter tells his sister to do what she needs to do. But, instead of shooting Dexter, Debra shot her police captain, who died from the gunshot wound on her chest.

So, it wasn’t Dexter who killed Maria LaGuerta, but it was actually Debra who pulled the trigger. However, Dexter was going to kill LaGuerta anyway and had a huge role to play in her death, even though he wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger and shot the police captain.

Again, Maria LaGuerta was already too deep in her investigations regarding the Bay Harbor Butcher. Because of that, Dexter planned to kill off both Maria LaGuerta and drug cartel kingpin Hector Estrada while making it seem like both of them killed each other.

While Dexter was successful at killing Estrada, he was about to do the same to LaGuerta until Debra entered the scene. And the rest is history, as Debra killed her captain on the spot.

Why Did Debra Kill LaGuerta?

At this point, you already know that Debra herself was a police detective working under Maria LaGuerta. If she was a subordinate, why in the world did she even kill her own boss?

Going back to when Dexter was about to kill LaGuerta, Debra came and tried to convince her brother to rethink his decision. But Maria woke up and tried to convince her subordinate to kill Dexter.

So, the only reason why Debra pulled the trigger on LaGuerta instead of Dexter was the fact that she was still in disbelief that her brother was the Butcher. As such, she killed LaGuerta to protect her own brother.

While Debra may have killed LaGuerta, her relationship with Dexter became sour. She also had to resign from her post as a lieutenant in the police force due to the events surrounding her former captain’s death, which she was responsible for. 

At the end of the series, Debra also died, but she did come back in New Blood as Dexter’s imaginary voice of conscience.