‘Chicago P.D. LaRoyce Hawkins Leaving Show In Season 14

EXCLUSIVE: After 13 seasons, original cast member LaRoyce Hawkins is leaving the NBC police procedural as a series regular, sources tell Deadline. He will return to wrap up his character Kevin Atwater’s storyline in the first two or three episodes of the upcoming Season 14, we hear.

Chicago P.D. is currently casting a new series regular, a Black cop who is an agent of chaos.

A rep for Wolf Entertainment, which produces the One Chicago franchise with Universal Television, declined comment.

Cast changes after each season of Chicago shows have become commonplace. Ahead of Season 13, Toya Turner left Chicago P.D. after playing Officer Kiana Cook for one season. Arienne Mandi joined as a new series regular, nabbing the role of Officer Eva Imani for Season 13. Hawkins joins fellow P.D. original cast members Jesse Lee Soffer and Tracy Spiridakos who recently exited the cop drama.

Hawkins debuted as Atwater in the Chicago P.D. series premiere in 2014 and has been a constant fan-favorite across the show’s thirteen seasons. As part of Hank Voight’s (Jason Beghe) Intelligence Unit, Atwater served alongside fellow elite officers that most recently included Adam Ruzek (Patrick John Flueger), Kim Burgess (Marina Squerciati), Dante Torres (Benjamin Levy Aguilar), and the previously mentioned Imani. As a handsome, honest, and loyal character, fans often discussed Atwater’s personal life, with the hopes that he would find someone equally as wonderful to settle down with.

And while he previously got close, things never got too serious. That is until Season 13 Episode 5, when Atwater reconnects with Officer Tasha Fox (Karen Obilom), a platonic friend from his past now turned lover. However, the potential love connection is immediately challenged as Tasha revealed that night that she is moving to Miami for a new job in a week. Before Atwater wakes up the next morning, she’s gone. But she leaves behind an orange, as a nod to her new home in the Sunshine State, with an open invitation for Atwater to join her.

As the season continued, Atwater struggled with reaching out to Tasha. He would start to write a text saying that he misses her, but never hit send. He pondered with what to say and whether he should reach out at all, but there was a pull between them that was undeniable. Later in Episode 11, Fox is back in Chicago and at Atwater’s door. She’s pregnant with their first child. If Atwater ends up leaving the Windy City for Miami, it would not be a surprise.