Deputy Owen Blackwood is a minor character only appearing in the first part of season one, usually as a lackey or assistant for Jim Valenti. He’s a Native American man of late middle age, around the same age as Jim, and tells Isabel that he grew up on the Mesaliko reservation outside of town.
In the pilot episode, Owen comes to the high school to take Liz to Valenti for questioning, and Valenti takes him along to the Crash Festival as backup, ordering him to watch Max while Jim chases down a mysterious figure in a golden cape. In “River Dog”, he recognizes the symbol on the broken pendant that Isabel found at Atherton’s geodesic dome, which leads Max and Liz to investigate the Mesaliko for any connection to aliens.Owen doesn’t appear after River Dog, which is only the seventh episode of the show. In many respects he’s replaced by Hanson, a much younger deputy who becomes the new Sheriff after Valenti loses that position. The two deputies do appear together in episode 2, “The Morning After.”