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Molly Underhill

Molly Underhill is a towering sheriff's deputy in Radford, Virginia who becomes the task force's steadiest local ally, rescues the team from the burning church, keeps their secrets, and by 1993 is sheriff after a "battlefield promotion."
Type NPC
Aliases Deputy Underhill; Sheriff Underhill; Molly
Affiliation Radford Sheriff's Department
Status Alive; sheriff (as of Radford Horrors 04)
First appearance Radford Horror 01
Played by Andre

Description

In Radford Horror 01 Molly is a big woman of about 45 and 5'11", a little heavy but muscular, with some gray in her hair. On the phone and radio she is folksy and friendly ("what can I do you for?") and blunt (Radford Horror 01, Radford Horror 07). In The Radford Horrors Andre describes her as six-two and "built like a brick shithouse," a little chubby, tired and sardonic (Radford Horrors 03).

History

The Radford Horror

Radford Horror 01. Molly answers the phones at the station and fetches the sheriff when the team calls. When Sheriff Roosevelt asks her to phone in the team's credentials to double-check them, she reads Kurt's case officer credentials and tells him, "Oh, you're a spooky spook" (Radford Horror 01).

Radford Horror 03. Andrew phones her about the Augustine household. She says she thinks she has met Derek, that the couple have a son of about eleven and an older daughter, that they attend church and have never crossed the radar of law enforcement, and that her own daughter has mentioned the son from school (Radford Horror 03).

Radford Horror 04. She pages the team early in the morning: Phoebe Augustine is missing from her bed. She brings coffee, hands out flashlights, assigns the shared radio channel 25.0, and calls a boat owner and a pilot in Salem with an ultralight. Afterward she takes the agents aside and tells them a mutilated girl's body, probably Amanda Lucky's, has been found by the interstate. "It's been a person every day," she says, and admits, "I was skeptical, but y'all were right. Whatever's going on here is fucked up." (Radford Horror 04)

Radford Horror 05. She radios news that the fingerprints from the roof are back; the only database hit is the earlier spaceman robbery, which points to Abelforth. The sheriff puts out an APB on Abelforth and on the spaceman sketch, and she brings in a tech from Roanoke for the assays. She shows the team photos of the scene where Amanda was found, announces the curfew and the community meeting at the church, and leads the team into it. She calls the break-in at Dr. Lori's office a prank and tells the team Derek Augustine is one of the town's pharmacists as well as a romance novelist (Radford Horror 05).

Radford Horror 07. She is a radio voice. She tells Kurt about the town's overdoses and a D.A.R.E. visit to the high school after one ended up in the ER, adding that she would love to "personally unpack" whoever is bringing the heroin in. Later she takes the team's call for help for the injured Phoebe and Wilbur in the woods (Radford Horror 07).

Radford Horror 08. Molly finds the badly hurt team after the fight at the burning church, shouting for them through the trees. Kurt gives her the foil-wrapped shadow poncho and the flashlight weapon; she shoves them in her back pocket, helps load the team onto a stretcher lowered from a helicopter and later returns the flashlight and foil in the hospital. She also tells the sheriff that the team had asked about the heroin (Radford Horror 08).

The Radford Horrors (1993)

Radford Horrors 02. Molly is now sheriff after a "battlefield promotion": Frank Roosevelt had a heart attack earlier in the year and has stepped back, though he is fine. She recaps the previous case for Daniel Webster and the team. Phoebe had gone to a rehab in California "like Narconon," but no one could reach her and scary lawyers threatened anyone who asked questions. The FBI then sent a task force, which stopped in briefly and also vanished. She digs up the lawyers' phone number, a map marked with the missing agents' campsite and a set of missing-person posters, and suspects the cartel is back (Radford Horrors 02).

Radford Horrors 03. She brings coffee, jokes that the team got "Pay n' Stayed," offers the mother-in-law suite at the back of her home as lodging, brings the Elizabeth George case, and drives them to the arcade. She explains that officially the missing people are in LA treatment (Radford Horrors 03). See LA treatment cover story.

Radford Horrors 04. Kurt phones her about Billy Thornton. She knows him and says they get along now that he has stopped doing heroin in front of the school, and agrees to offer him food and a cot (Radford Horrors 04).

Relationships

  • The task force: friendly and cooperative; keeps their evidence secret.
  • Frank Roosevelt: her sheriff in The Radford Horror; he steps back after a heart attack before her promotion.
  • Dr. Harvey Mauden: coroner who works with her office.

Trivia

  • Molly is introduced at about 5'11" in Radford Horror 01 and described as six-two in Radford Horrors 03.
  • Her last name was uncertain to Andre at the table, who briefly lost it in Radford Horror 03.

Appearances