Ricardo Irving is the tertiary antagonist of Resident Evil 5. A high-level employee of TRICELL, he was responsible for overseeing the company's fuel-resourcing department and controlled an oil field out in the wetlands of Kijuju. However, he was also deeply involved with bioterrorist activity in the region and was wanted by the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance for smuggling and selling Bio-Organic Weapons.
History
Irving's earliest known history begins in 2006 when he was contacted by Oswell E. Spencer, the former president of the defunct Umbrella Corporation. Having already made a name for himself in the criminal underworld, Irving had the connections and means of finding Spencer's former protégé Albert Wesker. As it happened, Wesker was also working with TRICELL at the time and so Irving passed on Spencer's message to him, thus becoming the catalyst for the events of the Kijuju Incident three years later.
In 2009, Irving, under orders from TRICELL Africa's CEO Excella Gionne, commenced the distribution of TRICELL's newly-developed Type 2 Plaga in the Kijuju Autonomous Zone. The Plaga outbreak led to many of the citizens being turned into Majini, leading to a rise in violence all over the region. Even the aboriginal Ndipaya and Sodibaya tribes from the wetlands were not safe as Irving had approached them with an advanced Type-3 Plaga, claiming that it was supposed to be a form of treatment for a deadly disease that was plaguing the area.
Believing Irving to be completing another deal with bioterrorists in a warehouse in Kijuju, the BSAA North American branch sent in their Alpha Team alongside SOA agents Chris Redfield and Sheva Alomar, intent on capturing Irving at the deal coordinates. It was later revealed, however, that Irving was fully-aware of the BSAA's knowledge of him, with he and the brainwashed Jill Valentine releasing an Uroboros test subject into the warehouse, quickly killing off Alpha Team. After he and Sheva disposed of the creature, Chris managed to obtain a hard disk containing sensitive information, including the location of the "actual" deal location: the quarry at the other end of the mine. However, when the BSAA agents reached the quarry, they only found Irving and Jill (of whose identity Chris was unaware), who quickly fled. It became evident that Chris and Sheva were being led on a long 'goose-chase'.
Chris and Sheva tailed Irving through the savannah to a village, followed by the wetlands and finally the oil field supervised by the TRICELL employee. Along the way, Irving made several attempts to eliminate them, including releasing a Popokarimu and a Ndesu upon them. While he succeeded in decimating the BSAA's West African Delta team, he was not able to stop the two agents.
Eventually, Irving realized that nothing he could do would stop Chris and Sheva - instead, he planned to abandon TRICELL with his accumulated wealth. Before he could do so, he was ambushed by Jill Valentine, who forced him to finish the job of eliminating Chris and Sheva. She provided him with a Dominant Species Plaga sample and ordered him to use it against the BSAA agents. In hopes of avoiding such a fate, Irving attempted to destroy his enemies by blowing up the oil field. Unfortunately, due to the field being drier than expected, the agents had time to escape and continue their pursuit of Irving as he fled across the marsh.
Cornered on his boat, Irving had no choice but to inject himself with the Plaga sample, transforming into a massive tentacled monster that attacked Chris and Sheva from beneath the surface of the water. Despite his powerful new form, Irving was defeated by the two agents. As he lay dying on the deck of the boat, Irving refused to explain what TRICELL's ultimate plan was - however, he did tell the agents that all their answers were in a cave up ahead, also letting slip Excella Gionne's involvement.
Mutation
After injecting himself with a Dominant-strain Plaga, Irving swiftly transformed into a gargantuan aquatic creature. As with other Dominant Plaga hosts, he retained his intelligence and consciousness though his body was radically altered. His mutant body was clearly meant to thrive in water, appearing as a gigantic fish-like monster with several large tentacles and four crustacean mandibles at its front that split open into a gaping cavernous mouth. This massive fish-like form was all the Plaga's body and Irving's true body was located within the beast's mouth, warped and reshaped into a bizarre organ that hung from the end of a long, tentacular tongue.
During his showdown with Chris and Sheva, Irving pursued his patrol boat and attacked from beneath the surface of the water, using his tentacles to try and crush the two BSAA agents. His mutant form was strong but did have weak points; there was a large orange patch of swollen muscle that Chris and Sheva targeted with the boat's onboard gun turrets and when Irving opened his giant mouth, his remaining human portion could be seen dangling from the end of his tongue, laughing maniacally. Irving's human portion was his main weak spot and after Chris and Sheva shot it enough times, the Irving beast bit off the end of its tongue and sank beneath the marsh. Irving's warped humanoid remnant remained conscious before he quickly bled to death.