Maria House (Republic of Doyle)

Villainous prosecutor Maria House

Maria House (Jennifer Podemski) is a villainess from "The Overpass," episode 5.02 of Republic of Doyle (airdate October 9, 2013). She is a Crown Prosecutor who was on the case involving criminal Big Charlie Archer and Stanley Westcott.

Maria appeared at the station and informed Rose and Malachy Doyle (with Leslie Bennett present) that she was filing new charges against both Archer and Stanley, while asking Malachy to contact Jake Doyle, who was in charge of delivering Stanley. She was later shown on the phone with police officer Toby Quinton, ordering him to find Stanley; meanwhile, Malachy enlisted Des to look into Maria, as he and Rose suspected her of wanting to rig the case, as Maria had nothing but mistrials while trying to prosecute Archer. All the while, Maria overheard Malachy voicing his suspicions to Jake, and as Malachy suspected, Maria sent Quinton after Jake, who eluded his former colleague by taking his car and driving off with Stanley.

However, the evil Maria later held Malachy and Rose under arrest for obstruction of justice, with Leslie revealing to the couple that they had been charged. She later admonished Quinton for losing Jake and Stanley, and later demanded Stanley in exchange for the charges being dropped. Rose made an apparent seductive pass at Maria, who repeated her statement, only for Rose to reveal that she obtained Maria's phone. The contents of the phone were revealed:  Maria had been receiving several payments for $1100, leading to the revelation that Archer had been paying Maria to pin their crimes all on Stanley. In addition, a search in Maria's briefcase revealed that she was running for office.

Maria confronted the Doyles and demanded Stanley, only for Rose to reveal the truth:  Maria sabotaged the case in order to get more TV time, which would help her in the polls. The villainess denied it at first, but after Rose stated that the press would have a field day with Maria's corruption, Maria acquiesced and allowed the Doyles to contact Jake. Maria's fate beyond this point wasn't revealed.