Villain SIDs

[bigdamnhero]

Re: Villain SIDs

 

Pursuing this a little off-topic' date=' can anyone come up with a plausible system for a reasonable facsimile of the United States in a superhero world to have, that lets secret ID/nongovernmental superheroes stop the bad guys and get them convicted, but doesn't tie them (the heroes) up in court? [/quote']

Yeah, I've wrestled with that one too. The best I've been able to come up with is to treat superheroes like informants or tipsters, not actual law enforcement agents. The hero provides evidence to the police, either directly ("Here's what I saw...") or indirectly ("Hey Joe, look what Action Man just left us..."). The police can then use that evidence to obtain warrants, or present it in court, subject to a few conditions:

• The officer must have reason to believe that the informant is reliable.
  
• The court cannot presume that the information is true just because Action Man said so, unless Action Man is present for cross-examination.
  
• The officer must then take other investigative steps to verify the information.

I'm not a lawyer (nor do I play one on TV), but I think you could almost make this work in something approximating the Real World. All you'd really need to change is:

1. Existing Heresy exemptions are interpreted a little more liberally,
   
2. Courts give police a little more benefit of the doubt in determining that a hero/informant is "reliable," and
   
3. (Related to #2) The fact that the informant's "true identity" is not known to the officer or the court is not in-and-of-itself taken as evidence of unreliability.

To try a scenario:

 

"Officer Jones and myself arrived on the scene and found the costumed hero known to us as Action Man, along with the unconscious defendants. Action Man told us he had overheard the defendants preparing to poison the city water reservoir, and described evidence of this crime located in the defendants' basement. Action Man also provided us with an audiotape he had made of the defendants planning this crime.

Based on my personal dealings with Action Man, as well as hundreds of dealings he's had with my fellow officers, I considered this information to be highly credible. We therefore detained the defendants until we could obtain a warrant to search their residence. In the conduct of that search, we found several gallons of various hallucinogenic chemicals, along with maps of the reservoir and various related documents; the defendants’ fingerprints were subsequently identified on all these items."

 

"The prosecution rests, Your Honor."

[Chimpira]

Re: Villain SIDs

 

Pursuing this a little off-topic, can anyone come up with a plausible system for a reasonable facsimile of the United States in a superhero world to have, that lets secret ID/nongovernmental superheroes stop the bad guys and get them convicted, but doesn't tie them (the heroes) up in court? The only thing I can think of is a special court system for metahuman crime, which uses telepaths, retrocogs, or something similar to convict captured criminals without any testimony from the heroes necessary.

 

I'd really like to keep things at that Scooby-Doo/Spider-Man level, where all you have to do is catch 'em and the cops/Primus/whatever come and cart them off... but I'd kind of like to have something at least semi-plausible, too.

 

I was inspired by a She-Hulk comic. In the comic Spider-man was allowed to take the stand to sue J. Jonah Jameson because he had been a member of The Avengers.Because The Avengers had been affiliated with the Government and had their own procedures to verify the identity of the hero, Spider-Man was allowed to testify.

 

In my world, I use registration for this purpose. Although not affiliated with the government (I had to register with selective service when I turned 18 and I do not consider myself government affiliated) those that have registered also have a procedure to verify their identity and can take the stand against criminals. They may also take a variety of tests that allow them access to crime scenes and what not.

 

Of course, just beating up the bad guy is not enough in my world. Their needs to be evidence of a wrong doing that connects to the villian. The first big villian that they fought was released because the heroes blew up all the evidence linking her to the crime. It seemed like a good idea to them at the time, as they wanted to keep the dread device from falling into the wrong hands. It was all I could do to keep myself from jumping up, dancing a jig and singing, "She's going to beat the rap." at the top of my lungs.

 

The point was driven home by a NPC detective after they broke up a super powered drug facility but did not try to catch the Ring leaders or have any evidence linking them to the operation or the murder that had gotten the PC's involved in the first place. "It's the difference in beating someone or winning. You want to beat the bad guy. Inflicting a painful lesson on him that he would soon not forget, maybe stalling or stopping what they are currently doing. I want to take the guy and put him away for his crimes. I want him to know that their was a price for his actions and he is held accountable, just like I am, by the laws of this land. I want him to be sent away to reflect upon this and God willing come back a changed man. I do not need him to be nice, I just need him to obey the laws. I call this winning. I like to win. I love to win. We did not win today."