In BBC’s Sherlock, the cab driver who kidnaps John Watson in “A Study in Pink” is Jeff Hope.
Jeff Hope is the serial killer at the centre of the series premiere. He poses as an ordinary London taxi driver while secretly forcing victims to choose between two identical-looking pills. Sherlock identifies him after connecting details from the victims and the taxi journeys.
Hope is not the same character as Jim Moriarty, Sherlock’s principal criminal adversary. Moriarty arranges the wider criminal challenge, while Hope is the murderer directly confronted in the episode. The character’s name is revealed during the investigation and in the closing confrontation.
“A Study in Pink” adapts elements of Arthur Conan Doyle’s first Sherlock Holmes novel, A Study in Scarlet, but relocates the story to contemporary London and introduces John through the Iraq War and his meeting with Sherlock.