Police say repeated questions about Molly Richards’ whereabouts exposed gaps in the story told after she disappeared.
DENTON, Texas — The murder case against a North Texas man accused in his girlfriend’s disappearance began with a father who kept asking where his daughter was and why no one could give him a direct answer that held together.
Authorities say Christopher Charles Sanders, 53, is now charged with killing Molly Richards, 31, after investigators spent months comparing the explanations given about her absence with phone records, witness accounts and evidence gathered from properties in Texas and South Dakota. The immediate importance of the case lies in how it shows police building a homicide allegation from concern, contradiction and physical evidence while still searching for the victim’s remains.
Steven Richards told police he last saw his daughter on Nov. 18, 2025, after she had moved in with Sanders in Little Elm the month before. He later received a message from her phone saying she and Sanders were headed to South Dakota. That alone might not have stood out, but a Dec. 1 message from the same phone said she was checking into a mental health facility for bipolar disorder. Then the direct contact stopped. Steven Richards began reaching out for updates, and his concern deepened as Sanders did not respond consistently. In later reporting on the affidavit, one of the father’s messages was quoted simply: “Where is Molly anyway?” It became a plain question around which the rest of the investigation turned.
What police say Sanders told people about Richards changed over time. According to public reports, he first indicated she was seeking mental health treatment. Later he told her father she was not at a facility and should call him. Law&Crime reported that Sanders also told people Richards had decided to stay with another man in South Dakota. Investigators treated those statements as claims to be tested. Officers contacted hotels, hospitals, motels and mental health facilities and found no record that Richards had shown up, WFAA reported. The shifting account also mattered because police said it came against a background in which Richards had told her father Sanders had become physically abusive and controlling before she disappeared.
The father’s concern gained weight as police gathered signs that Richards had not left by choice. In January, officers received information that her identification, credit cards and other belongings were at a South Dakota property linked to Sanders. Later, a woman caring for Sanders’ dogs at that property reportedly found more of Richards’ things, including bank cards, a laptop and unopened mail. Police also said Richards’ phone was reactivated on Feb. 19 and pinged near Sanders’ Denton home. Investigators searching properties tied to Sanders in Denton and Little Elm then found bedding with blood residue, and a human remains detection dog alerted in a bedroom, according to local reports. Each discovery narrowed the space between suspicion and accusation.
The emotional center of the case, though, remains the contrast between what a family was told and what the evidence later suggested. Public reporting on the affidavit said Steven Richards had told officers that his daughter mentioned abuse before she vanished. Another report said police had previously observed possible strangulation marks on her body. Against that backdrop, the messages about treatment and travel looked less like a clean explanation and more like a way to keep worried relatives waiting. Police have not publicly said who sent every message from Richards’ phone, but Law&Crime reported investigators believe Sanders pretended to be her in texts after her death.
The case hardened further when police began laying out the physical and travel evidence. Officers said they found a receipt for a 24-inch bow saw, a reciprocating saw, 10 five-gallon buckets, gloves and a tamper. They also traced Richards’ vehicle through Oklahoma on the way to South Dakota and identified a one-hour-and-nine-minute gap near property tied to Sanders in Marietta, Oklahoma. Investigators now believe Richards was killed and buried in Oklahoma, though her remains have not been found. Sanders was arrested there on March 7 while traveling from South Dakota, according to accounts of the affidavit, and police said he denied killing Richards and would not say where she was.
The people closest to Richards are not quoted at length in the public record now available, and that absence is notable in itself. The public voice that does come through most clearly is the father’s steady insistence that something was wrong. In a case without a recovered body, without a public cause of death and without a detailed defense response on the record, the earliest warning signs came not from a laboratory but from a parent who believed the story he was hearing did not fit his daughter’s life.
Sanders remains jailed in Denton County as police continue searching for Richards’ remains and assembling the case. Where things stand now is stark: a family’s unanswered questions led to a murder charge, but the investigation will not be complete until authorities either recover Richards or present the full evidence in court.
Author note: Last updated April 20, 2026.