Gender Female First appearance Series 1, episode 1 | Portrayed by Jenny Agutter Last appearance Series 2, episode 9 | |
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Occupation Phillips Security Founder & Head,
Former: Senior Case Officer, Section K Similar Zoe Reynolds, Malcolm Wynn‑Jones, Danny Hunter, Tom Quinn, Zafar Younis | ||
Tessa Phillips is a character in the television drama series Spooks. She was played by the actress Jenny Agutter.
Phillips joined MI5 in the early 1980s and eventually headed her own counter-terrorism unit, known as Section K. While she was working on a case with Zoe Reynolds, Reynolds discovered that Phillips was running "phantom agents", non-existent sources whom she claimed to be bribing for important information. In reality she was keeping the money for herself, thereby defrauding MI5 out of tens of thousands of pounds. She left MI5 at the end of the first season, branded a traitor.
In series 2, she runs her own private security firm. At some point she spots an opportunity for both financial gain and revenge. By selling information to the Chala drug cartel she deliberately sabotages an operation that Harry Pearce is running, causing the death of an informant with whom Tom Quinn had bonded. Phillips flees the country leaving behind a video for Pearce, in which she gloats about trumping MI5.