Sam Lavelle

Species:	Human
Affiliation:	Starfleet
Rank:	Lieutenant junior grade
Occupation:	Operations officer
Status:	Active (2370)
Played by:	Dan Gauthier

Sam Lavelle was a 24th century Human Starfleet officer posted to the USS Enterprise-D.

History

"Think promotion"

As an ensign, Lavelle shared quarters with his friend Taurik on board the Enterprise; something he was not very happy about. He was also the conn officer on the alpha shift. His circle of friends included Nurse Alyssa Ogawa, Ensign Sito Jaxa, and Ten Forward waiter Ben. The group had regular poker nights, sometimes including Ogawa's fiancé Andrew Powell. Lavelle felt Powell was one of the worst poker players he had ever met.

Lavelle was very career-oriented and driven and wanted a promotion more than anything else in the world. In 2370, he was up for the operations officer position, in competition with Sito Jaxa. Although he was the obvious choice for the promotion, his tumultuous relationship with his commanding officer William T. Riker somewhat got him off to a rough start. Lavelle was always nervous around him and Riker took the opportunity to criticize small issues generally to Lavelle's embarrassment. His friends thought he was just imagining the situation, but Lavelle believed that Riker did not like him and had it in for him. Even though Lavelle tried to get on Riker's good side and had an immense amount of respect for him, he believed him to be uptight, once stating that Riker probably slept in his uniform.

Lavelle desperately seeking Riker's approval

Ben once encouraged Lavelle to introduce himself and get to know the man. However, Lavelle's interaction with Riker was awkward and short lived: Lavelle had believed Riker to be from Canada and struck up a conversation with him based on that assumption. But when it turned out that Riker was actually from Alaska, a much embarrassed Lavelle quickly retreated, regretting having once again said the wrong thing. He was sure that he would not get the promotion if it was up to Riker.

Riker saw these incidents as no more than attempts by Lavelle to ingratiate himself. However, Counselor Troi pointed out to him that in fact he and Lavelle were a lot alike and that he should not hold Lavelle's inexperience with such matters against him. Troi's advice convinced Riker and he decided that he may indeed have been too hard on Lavelle.

After Sito's disappearance during an away mission, Lavelle was eventually promoted to the ops position, although his success was bittersweet as it was accompanied by a certain amount of guilt. His friends told him that she would have been happy for him and that the best way to honor Sito's memory would be to excel in his new position. (TNG: "Lower Decks")

Template:EnterpriseOperationsOfficers

Appendices

Background

Lavelle was played by Dan Gauthier. It is unknown whether or not his full given name is Samuel, as the Star Trek: Starship Creator bios written by Mike and Denise Okuda claim. The character's name came from two sources: a close friend of René Echevarria and Ron Wilkerson's Canadian Labrador Samwell. (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion)

Apocrypha

In "Heart of Darkness" a comic book of the Star Trek Unlimited series, Lavelle was mentioned as ascending to security chief of the USS Enterprise-E with the rank of full Lieutenant.

In the novel series Star Trek: The Dominion War, Lavelle was serving with Taurik on the USS Aizawa after the outbreak of the Dominion War.

The Pocket TNG Behind Enemy Lines mentioned that Lavelle and others from the Aizawa became prisoners of war of the Dominion, and "Tunnel Through the Stars" depicted his return to the Federation and wartime romance with Ro Laren.

In an alternate timeline illustrated in the TNG Myriad Universes short story, Brave New World, Lavelle achieved the rank of Lieutenant and was serving as flight controller on board the Enterprise-D by 2378. In that timeline, he was romantically involved with Sito Jaxa.

External link

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