Paul Ballard (Tahmoh Penikett) is the ex-FBI special agent assigned to the Dollhouse case. While most in the Bureau view the case as a joke, he takes it seriously, to the point of obsession. Throughout the show, his main objective is to rescue Caroline. In Man on the Street, a mole in the Dollhouse secretly imprints Echo with a secret personality who informs Ballard that he must be discharged from the FBI in order to throw the Dollhouse off of his trail before he truly can uncover the truth of the organization. He had become involved with his neighbor Mellie before discovering the Dollhouse imprinted her to spy on him. He then distances himself from her, using her vulnerability to follow her to the Dollhouse's location. In "Omega" he agrees to work for the Dollhouse in exchange for the freedom of November. Ballard was wiped by Alpha in "A Love Supreme" and his body left on life support, however Topher is able to partially restore him in "The Attic" by converting him into an active and imprinting him with the scan Alpha took of him. However, due to Alpha's brutal treatment, parts of his brain have been permanently damaged, and Topher is forced to "rewire" his brain to function without them; at the cost of some other mental capacity, namely the connection he had with Echo. He was killed in the final episode when an unknown shooter shot him in the brain while trying to help one of the survivors. His imprinted slab was left by a reedemed Alpha and was later imprinted into Echo so they could be together.