Lewis Snart

"Son, you and I both know that there's casualties in this line of work."

- Lewis Snart to Leonard Snart

Lewis Snart was the abusive father of Leonard Snart, and Lisa Snart. He was also a corrupt former police officer of the Central City Police Department.

Raising Leonard and Lisa
Lewis came upon a man talking to his son one night. He gave him the Maximillian Emerald, which Lewis had been planning to steal in a number of days. He left but not before leaving a cryptic hint that Lewis would become an abusive husband and father and that the man who broke into his home was actually his son from the future. Some days later, he attempted to sell the jewel to an undercover police officer, but was instead arrested, landing him 5 years in jail for larceny. When he was released, Lewis began to take his anger out on Leonard. Eventually he had another child, a daughter Lisa, whom he would eventually come to take his anger out on also and left her with numerous scars. Lewis was freqently in jail for extended periods at a time for  armed robbery, aggravated assault and assault with a deadly weapon. Because Lewis was freqently in an out of prison Leonard was forced to raise Lisa like she were his own daughter, rather than a sister in Lewis' absence.



Heist with Leonard Snart
41 Years later, Lewis escaped Iron Heights. He found his son and daughter while the two, along with Mick Rory, were committing a robbery. Lewis had his son kidnapped and his daughter injected with thermite. Lewis then threatened his son to work for him or he'd kill Lisa. When the Flash came to "rescue" Leonard, Lewis was shocked when he saw his son cover the Flash in ice. Lewis told his son he didn't think he had it in him and the two left. While planning on a heist, Lewis killed David Rutenberg who told his son to shut up. Without a tech guy, Barry infiltrated the team, volunteering to help as "Sam". Lewis was doubtful at first due to his youthful appearance but Leonard vouched for him. When they arrive for their next heist, Lewis, Leonard, and "Sam" pose as janitors. When their ID badges were failing, Lewis prepared to pull a gun, but "Sam" figured another way without the guards being killed. When they arrived on the twenty-seventh floor, they spotted two security guards. Leonard and Lewis argued as Lewis was wrong about the timing. After "Sam" subdued them behind their backs, Lewis had "Sam" breach the security code. After "Sam" got them in, Lewis shot "Sam". When they arrived at the vault, Leonard froze the lasers and Lewis went to pick the lock. Lewis was told they had 125 seconds before the security system defrosts. After they obtained the diamonds, the sirens went off and as they escaped, they were intercepted by the Flash. Lewis told his son to kill the Flash or he would kill Lisa. As soon as Cisco removed the thermite from Lisa, the Flash broke the news to Lewis. As Lewis turned around to his son, the latter fired his cold gun at him. Lewis asked why Leonard did it as he always thought his son hated the Flash, but Lewis was told he was hated more, he died straight after.

Personality
Before going to prison, Lewis was a caring father, albeit not exactly an ideal one. He did sought to protect his son from a stranger (an adult Leonard from the future), albeit by pointing a gun at the adult Leonard right in front of his young son.

In his later years, Lewis was extremely arrogant, selfish, greedy, ruthless, immoral, unreasonable and unstable. These combined traits made him a very dangerous man. He had little to no regard for innocent lives, repeatedly showing he was willing to kill innocent guards without remorse. This extended to his own men as he killed an associate for disrespecting his son (as only he was allowed to do it) and once his subordinates were no longer useful to him he kills them without hesitation as demonstrated on Barry Allen posing as a security expert. Although he was intelligent his intellect was not at the same level of his son's. This combined with his arrogance made him a very sloppy criminal. He regularly disregarded his son's advice about timing and contingencies despite Leonard's experience and reputation with thievery, and killed whoever annoyed him.

Lewis showed no caring for his own family. When his kids were children, he regularly abused both Lisa and Leonard physically when he was angry, forcing Leonard to raise his sister like she were his own daughter. This cruelty continued into his old age as he blackmailed his own son into assisting him on his final heist by implanting a bomb in his own daughter's neck. These negative traits of his are what eventually led to Lewis' painful yet deserve death at the hands of his own son, Leonard Snart.

Behind the Scenes

 * In the commercial for Family of Rogues, Cisco nicknamed Lewis "Colonel Cold". For reasons currently unknown, this scene was cut from the aired episode, potentially due to the character's quick exit from the show.