Joe Denton

Joe Denton is the main character of Small Crimes, played by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.

Life Before Events of The Film
Little is known of Joe's background, other than him having a wife and two daugthers, and being a former cop who eventually ended up on the payroll of mafia boss Manny Vassey. Joe attacked district attorney Phil Coakley, presumably under the orders of the aforementioned mafia boss, and was arrested and incarcerated for six years.

Events of Small Crimes"
After being released from prison and finding his ex-wife has left the city with their children, he moves in with his elderly parents. Denton researches his ex-wife on the internet, eventually digging up a phone number. After briefly talking to one of his daughters, his ex-wife takes the phone and threatens to press charges if he ever contacts them again.

Denton's return into a life of crime begins when he passes a bar on his way back home. Although a recovering alcoholic, he enters and orders a drink. His friend Scotty, the brother of Denton's slain partner, greets him and offers him any help he needs. A young woman asks Denton for a ride home. Denton is surprised when she reveals herself to be Coakley's daughter and intentionally bloodies herself. Cued by her cries for help, two men drag Denton from his car; Denton beats both men savagely. After Denton is questioned by the police, Coakley admits the evidence backs up his story and reluctantly asks if Denton wants to press charges. Denton declines, saying he wants to leave his history in the past, to the disgust of Coakley and Lieutenant Pleasant, who calls him a disgrace.

Pleasant, revealed to also be corrupt, demands Denton kill mob boss Manny Vassey, who has found religion on his deathbed. Pleasant explains Vassey's guilty conscience may lead him to confess to Coakley. Pleasant promises to help Denton renegotiate the terms of the settlement with his ex-wife if he kills Vassey. At his house, Vassey denies the rumors. As Vassey falls asleep, Denton begins to suffocate him, only to be interrupted by Charlotte Boyd, Vassey's hospice nurse. Denton smoothly thanks her for her work and leaves the house, where he encounters Vassey's sadistic son, Junior. Junior threatens to kill Denton, enraged that Vassey would see him while avoiding his own son.

Frustrated with his suspicious behavior, Denton's parents demand explanations. When they disbelieve his lies, Denton angrily accuses them of having no faith in his redemption. Denton encounters Boyd again at a diner, and the two soon begin dating. After Pleasant threatens him and his parents, Denton probes Boyd for a way to access Vassey. When this fails, Pleasant suggests he murder Coakley instead. Denton breaks into Coakley's house but can not bring himself to do it. Instead, he bribes Toni, a prostitute Coakley has been seeing, into secretly recording him.

Denton sets up a camera in Coakley's hotel room and waits in a nearby room for Coakley to arrive. During Coakley's tryst, Toni's boyfriend, Rooster arrives. Driven by jealousy, Rooster kills Toni and is killed by Coakley in return. Denton witnesses the shooting and waits for Coakley to leave before running into the room to look for the camera. Realizing that Coakley found and took the camera, Denton returns home dejected.

After another argument with his parents, in which his father asks him to leave, an unknown assailant fires several shots into Denton's parents' house, wounding his mother. Denton confesses to Boyd, with whom he has grown closer, that the situation has spiraled out of control. She assures him it will work out, and, unknown to Denton, murders Vassey. Junior catches Boyd in the act. Denton is kidnapped by Junior's thugs and Junior reveals he has tortured and presumably killed Boyd. Denton's protests that he was uninvolved with Vassey's death are interrupted by the arrival of Scotty.

Denton and Scotty kill Junior and his thugs, but Scotty is shot. Denton attempts to save Scotty but stops when he learns that Scotty was the one who shot his mother. Coakley had revealed to Scotty that it was Denton who killed his brother under Junior's orders. Denton leaves Scotty to die and receives a call from Pleasant informing him that Coakley died in a car accident. Coakley had been distracted, watching the recording of his shooting of Rooster while driving.

Denton ransacks his parents' house for dirty money they found and hid from him before kicking him out. After Denton finds the money and indicates his desire to deliver it to his children, Denton's father says he will not allow Denton anywhere near the children, fearing Denton's self-destructive impulses will harm them. When Denton incredulously asks what his father can do to stop him, Denton's father stabs him. In his dying moments, Denton wipes his father's fingerprints off the knife and adds his own, to make the wound appear self-inflicted.