Stephen Saunders

Stephen Saunders is the main villain of the third season of 24. He threatens the US with a deadly virus.

He was portrayed by Paul Blackthorne.

Biography
Stephen Saunders was originally part of Jack Bauer's team. On the mission to kill Victor Drazen, he was supposedly killed in an explosion. He survived, but was abandoned by his team.

To get his revenge, Saunders planned to hold the entire US hostage by threatening to kill millions of people with the Cordilla Virus. He acquired the Cordilla Virus from his associate, Michael Amador, whom Jack masterminded an unsuccessful attempt to get the virus from to prevent him from doing any such thing. CTU tried to track Amador, but Saunders suspected this, so he blew up Amador and one of his own men with a bomb.

Saunders had an associate, Marcus Alvers, release a vial of the virus in a hotel, killing over 700 people, and threatened David Palmer that he would release more unless he did what he told him. First, he told him to say "the sky is falling" at a press conference. When Ryan Chappelle began to run money traces, Saunders saw it necessary to eliminate him, so his next order for Palmer was to kill him. Chase Edmunds ran an unsuccessful attempt to capture Saunders, who had also expected this, and so Jack was forced to kill Chappelle.

Palmer did not give in to any more of Saunders's demands, however, it was discovered that he had a daughter, Jane. Jack talked to Saunders on the phone and threatened to hurt Jane, while CTU began closing in on Saunders's hideout. However, Saunders took Michelle Dessler hostage, and forced Tony Almeida to let him escape.

Saunders got Tony to trade Jane for Michelle, but she ran, not wanting to go with her father's men, and CTU and other law enforcement agents arrived, engaging Saunders and his men in a shootout. Saunders attempted to escape in a helicopter, but a fighter jet blew it up, and Saunders was captured. Saunders refused to give the location of the other vials of the virus, until Jack threatned to send Jane into the hotel where the first vial of the virus was released.

The last vial of the virus was in the possession of Arthur Rabens, whom CTU told Saunders to identify in several photos of people in a subway. As Saunders looked through the pictures, Teresa Ortega, the wife of Gael, the virus's first victim in the hotel, took a gun and shot Saunders as revenge for her husband's death.