Charles Ashford

Dr. Charles Ashford is a fictional character from Resident Evil: Apocalypse, portrayed by Jared Harris. Charles was a wheelchair-bound scientist employed by the Umbrella Corporation and the father of Angela Ashford.

Background
In Apocalypse, Dr. Ashford was responsible for the creation of the t-virus, which could revive dead or dying cells, and although he created it for medical purposes, Umbrella took away the virus and perverted it by creating other viral agents. Before Umbrella took away his creation, Dr. Ashford managed to use the base t-Cells to cure his crippled daughter Angela. Charles was also responsible for the construction of The Hive, and was the programmer for the Red Queen, whose holographic representation he modeled after Angela.

Outbreak
During the outbreak at Raccoon City, Dr. Ashford was among the many valuable employees whom Umbrella had evacuated before quarantining the city. His daughter was to be evacuated, but was involved in a car crash and never got out in time. Certain that his daughter was still alive, Ashford went behind Major Cain's back (who was firm in his belief that Angela was in fact dead) and contacted numerous survivors, including Alice, Jill Valentine and Carlos Olivera, and agreed to help them escape the city in return for rescuing his daughter.

Death
Although they succeeded, Major Timothy Cain intervened in Dr. Ashford's plan, all just to pit Alice against mutated Matt Addison. Ashford was briefly reunited with his daughter, before Cain shot him in the chest in order to force Alice to fight. Ashford's corpse was later reanimated as a Zombie, and with some form of poetic justice, was the first among many to swarm and feast upon the injured Cain. Ashford was killed when a nuclear bomb destroyed Raccoon City, vaporizing everything inside it.