The smooth, red headed Lieutenant of the Miami Police department known as Horatio Caine was born David Caruso in Forest Hills, Queens New York on January 7^th 1956.

Caruso attended elementary and middle school at Our Lady Queen of Martyrs in Queens, the same primary school attended by Ray Romano and Pia Zadora.

After middle school David went on to graduate from Archbishop Molloy High School in Queens, in 1974.

His first film appearance was in the film Getting Wasted, in which he played the part of Henry.  The next decade saw David in supporting roles on the big screen, appearing in such films as An Officer and a Gentleman, First Blood, Blue City, and China Girl. David Caruso’s appearances on television had him in the recurring role as the gang leader of "The Shamrocks" on Hill Street Blues in the early 80's.

He also had a memorable two-episode appearance on the television series Crime Story. Many of David’s film and TV appearances were rooted in crime or crime fighting based characters, along with strong supporting roles in the crime films Kings of New York and Mad Dog and Glory, in which both his characters were cynical streetwise cops.

These characters made Hollywood aware of his talents as an actor. Both films ultimately helped pave the way for his breakthrough starring TV role when he landed the part of Detective John Kelly on the new series NYPD Blue which over the years starred actors such as Kathy Bates, Christopher Meloni, Debra Messing and David Schwimmer.

After garnering much praise and award nominations for his work, Caruso made news by leaving the highly-rated show the following year to pursue a career in film, but was unable to really establish himself as a leading man movie star despite starring in the crime thrillers Kiss_of_Death" title="Kiss of Death">Kiss of Death which also starred Samuel L Jackson, Nicolas Cage and Helen Hunt and the movie Jade in which he appeared with Linda Fiorentino.

With unfortunate timing for Caruso, he returned to television as the star of the short-lived CBS law drama series Michael Hayes, which only ran for one season but had it made the small screen post 9/11 it may have been better received as David played a Big Apple-based federal prosecutor.

After a short spell out of the spotlight Caruso returned to the silver screen with a supporting role as Russell Crowe's mercenary sidekick in the movie Proof of Life, which also starred Meg Ryan. In 2002 David Caruso began his role as Lt. Horatio Caine in the popular CSI spin off TV series CSI: Miami. In one episode Caruso had the pleasure of appearing with Heidi Klum who played herself.

Apart from his acting career, David is a co-owner of a clothing and furniture store based in Miami which is called “Steam”.

With his second wife, Rachel Ticotin, he has a daughter, Greta and with his girlfriend Liza Marquez he has a son, Marquez Anthony.

According to court records an ex-girlfriend Paris Papiro filed a palimony suit against David Caruso who paid an undisclosed sum to Paris.

Recently on an episode of The Panel, a show which airs in Ireland, Colin Murphy made a comment on David’s "gingerness", saying that his original name was not Caruso but Robinson and that he had "the most Irish head on him .... a ginger sex symbol - who would of thought?"

On an episode of the Late Show with David Letterman comedian Jim Carrey satirically impersonated Caruso. Carrey asked for an “intense close-up” from the camera, spoke in a deep voice and put on sunglasses. At that point Paul Schaffer and the Late Night Band played the CSI: Miami theme and Carrey ran off screen.