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Falling Iron (IM MCU/WORM)

Iron Man's first patrol

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Arthur Hansen said:
It doesn't happen, which means what you are pointing out isn't the simple truth you think it is. No prosecutor is actually going to succeed at convicting (and maybe even bothering to charge them) with kidnapping for, what is in effect, a bad prank gone wrong.
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...you're triggering me like crazy here.
Dareth said:
I'm a public defender. I've literally seen this happen - convictions that follow the letter of the law, and not public assumptions of what the law is. I've seen it happen with kidnapping where a custodial parent simply didn't return a child at the end of scheduled visitation (not in nh, so slightly different statute). Sometimes it's exactly that simple. I acknowledge that not every prosecutor would seek kidnapping charges here, but they'd certainly seek assault. Who knows what would happen in trial, or what plea would be offered, but they definitely could and likely would charge it.

Regardless, this probably belongs in Worm general discussion thread. So I'll be done with this topic, and you can choose whether or not to believe someone who works in the criminal justice system and actually has direct experience with these issues.
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Whoa, really? Because I just had a brainwave.

The hazardous medical waste - remember there are blood-soaked tampons and rotten food in that locker - things that could plausibly cause crippling or even lethal infections... except that they're from public waste receptacles.

She trapped a human being in a badly ventilated container where she couldn't sit down or stand up - basically a Vietnam War-style tiger cage - except it's actually just your average high school locker.

What if Sophia planned the whole thing, right down to the legal repercussions? What if she planned every element of this event to cause maximum physical and psychological trauma possible without actually breaking any laws?

You could at least get this sadist for premeditated aggravated assault, right? For intentionally subjecting a human being to disgust, humiliation, confinement and pain?
 
And... there's someone that actually ignored the entire last few pages.

[edit] And a small note from WoG is that if Taylor had gone and tried to join the Wards she would have had to be teammates with Sophia.

This legal hateboner shit is making me want to lock this thread.
 
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Dareth said:
That's depraved indifference. Also, it's totally irrelevant to what we were talking about. You can't attempt a depraved indifference murder, because part of the concept is that it occurred unintentionally. It's contradictory - intentionally trying to do something unintentional. This is something that is frequently tested on bar exams, which is probably why I remember it so vividly.
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You missed the point. The definition of attempted murder, note again the term is ATTEMPTED murder, includes either actual intent, or and act which demonstrated "reckless or extreme disregard for human life". The classic case is firing a firearm towards a building, if you did that the prosecution doesn't have to prove intent. Similarly if the prosecution could demonstrate the locker counted as "reckless or extreme disregard for human life" what the Trio intended would be irrelevant, that would be enough to prove attempted murder.

This assumes of course that the more extreme interpretations of the locker are valid, and that you could convince a jury that a bunch of 15 y/o girls should have known how dangerous the locker would be, but that's a separate issue.

Arthur Hansen said:
They'd have to slap a good percentage of the school with accessory.
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Good point.

Not arguing that attempted murder makes sense on a charge sheet, just that it's technically something they could be charged. Thinking about it I recall reading that in some jurisdictions aggravated assault aggravated assault actually carries a more severe penalty than attempted murder so there really wouldn't be any reason for the prosecutor to be reaching for an attempted murder charge.
 
I know I said I would stop talking about this, but it's frustrating seeing people posting inaccurate information.

TheUnicorn said:
The definition of attempted murder, note again the term is ATTEMPTED murder, includes either actual intent, or and act which demonstrated "reckless or extreme disregard for human life"
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Not in New Hampshire. Were you the one who linked the dictionary earlier? That's not an accurate representation of the law. The law for attempts in nh is: Section 629:1 Attempt.

As you can see, your definition does not apply in this jurisdiction. Prosecutors don't use Merriam-Webster for legal terminology.

TheUnicorn said:
Good point.
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It isn't. No one is an accessory for failing to report another person's criminal conduct unless they somehow contributed to it in a more direct way than by a failure to act against it or assist the victim. As far as I know, there is no affirmative duty that would attach to any student under these circumstances. This would be true everywhere in the U.S that I'm aware of. Those liable are likely limited to those who were aware of the plan for the locker incident and assisted in preparation for it.
 
Do you guys mind dropping this? There is enough 'evidence' for both sides, but we have to pretend that canon Worm events are possible or feasible, just like a PI gumshoe figuring out all the clues in 60 minutes and capturing the badguy.
 
I'd like to agree. The Author has given his view, and while some of us may agree or disagree, it is his choice.
 
Arthur Hansen said:
Have to work with the canon, which is that nothing came of a girl ending up in the hospital over the locker incident.

Hmm. Probably more due to inner city crap high school more than anything.
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Actually it probably went more like:

Police: upon initial investigation, Sophia's name was mentioned, this triggered a flag in their system that pushed the case to the PRT.

PRT: sends Sophia's "case worker" to check things out.

"Case worker": covers it up / downplays the victim's injuries; says Sophia not involved.

PRT: closes the case, as it doesn't involve a parahuman.

And it never gets investigated further.
Dareth said:
Not in New Hampshire. Were you the one who linked the dictionary earlier?
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That was actually me, I couldn't find a law to quote for that one, I'm not a lawyer and don't usually look up the specific text of laws. And the definition did point out that removal from the premises wasn't required for kidnapping. It didn't help that I was on about 40 hours without sleep at the time, and didn't feel like looking harder.


I'll just say one more thing about the topic before dropping it. If the PRT wanted the charges to stick, they would. I'll point to Canary as a canon example of the absolute worst possible interpretation of events being used to screw someone over legally, so there is precedent for it to happen. Though likewise, if the PRT wanted her to get much more minor charges, they could make that happen too.
 
Dacl73 said:
I'd like to agree. The Author has given his view, and while some of us may agree or disagree, it is his choice.
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I have to disagree with this stance on principle; "being the author" is not nor should it be a protection against people saying you're not making sense. Now, I agree that the PRT wouldn't give a f^%$ about the whole Sophia thing, so I don't think that's inherently implausible. But that's not because the PRT is reasonable, it's because they're supervillains. Actually, worse than that; they're incompetent supervillains, because if they were competent they would at least care about group cohesion, among countless other practical concerns. But again, I agree with the Author that the PRT is too dumb to do something vaguely competent.

I do however feel like there is an increasing fog of vagueness settling over the story, behind which details become too obscured to be sure of. Thus the writer gains the power to do almost anything just so long as the chain of logic passes through that fog, because hey, who's to say that there isn't a logical chain of events in all that mist? The problem is that watching the-Undersiders-pop-out-of-a-fog-bank-to-briefly-make-a-mess-only-to-get-jumped-by-a-few-Avengers-who-followed-them-out-of-the-fog-bank,-and-then-the-whole-group-immediately-returning-from-whence-they-came isn't all that compelling, because I have no idea why any of it is happening. Its all just meaningless pseudo-action.

Admittedly, I'm not really sure how to fix this problem beyond a general; "I'd like to know what's going on and why."
 
Dareth said:
Not in New Hampshire.
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Which if true would be relevant if the we were discussing a crime in RL New Hampshire. As I've noted repeatedly , like most things it varies between jurisdictions.
Dareth said:
Prosecutors don't use Merriam-Webster for legal terminology.
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Which is why I make sure I always use legal resources (of which there are plenty online) as references.

Edit:Given the author's request we should take this to the canon discussion thread if we're going to continue it.
 
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Arthur Hansen said:
No, I'm sorry. Breaking out mass murderers and the worst sadists in the world is incredibly far beyond stupid, abusive and vile teenage pranks gone too far.
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IIRC, isn't Marquis compared to Lung, Kaiser, and Skidmark as being less sadistic? It stands to reason that there could be a range of supervillains who got sent to the Birdcage without being in the worst category. Assault might have hired himself out to this hypothetical group of boss level villains. After all Canary got railroaded and caged, and she wasn't even a villain.

Arthur Hansen said:
People with hate-$%!ers really annoy me on this issue.
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Really, I thought they had already gone past the point of getting shot. I mean, it's a gang filled school; Taylor was white in a school with neo-nazis while getting bullied by a black girl.

EDIT: Oops didn't read to the end before posting.
 
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Inv1ctus6243 said:
IIRC, isn't Marquis compared to Lung, Kaiser, and Skidmark as being less sadistic? It stands to reason that there could be a range of supervillains who got sent to the Birdcage without being in the worst category. Assault might have hired himself out to this hypothetical group of boss level villains. After all Canary got railroaded and caged, and she wasn't even a villain.
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Most (probably 99% of them) are either unrepentant mass murderers (Marquis) or evil monsters that killed fewer. Or both. Black Kaze killed thousands of people on her own. Teacher murdered a vice president as part of his plan to take over what he could of the world.

Canary is an outlier because of her master power and looks that sorta match the Simurgh. Heck, I'm surprised that she didn't get forcibly recruited by the Fallen. [shudder]
 
Arthur Hansen said:
Most (probably 99% of them) are either unrepentant mass murderers (Marquis) or evil monsters that killed fewer. Or both.
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That's a valid interpretation, but not something actually supported by canon. Yes that's what the birdcage is supposed to be for, but then you have Canary, the fact that Taylor accidentally seeing Sophia's face was apparently enough to make the Birdcage a valid punishment, some sort of "three strike" rule that relates somehow to the Birdcage, etc. I'd say most of the canon evidence suggests that's not true in practice.
 
TheUnicorn said:
Taylor accidentally seeing Sophia's face was apparently enough to make the Birdcage a valid punishment
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It was because they were assuming Taylor had broken the truce in order to figure out Shadow Stalker's identity, not just because she saw her face.

Honestly, I don't think there's enough shown in canon either way to work out what the majority of the Birdcage population is like.
 
Franklymydear said:
It was because they were assuming Taylor had broken the truce in order to figure out Shadow Stalker's identity, not just because she saw her face.
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Which doesn't affect my point, the fact that they mistook her actions is not important, the fact that Taylor didn't kill and was a valid candidate for the Birdcage.

Franklymydear said:
Honestly, I don't think there's enough shown in canon either way to work out what the majority of the Birdcage population is like.
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True, however I think there is enough to say there's at least a significant minority of people sent there who aren't horrible murderers.
 
Franklymydear said:
It was because they were assuming Taylor had broken the truce in order to figure out Shadow Stalker's identity, not just because she saw her face.

Honestly, I don't think there's enough shown in canon either way to work out what the majority of the Birdcage population is like.
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Canary is the only one shown in canon actually in the Birdcage that is shown to be railroaded. I don't believe that Dragon made any thoughts or comments on other prisoners that were innocent and should not have been in there. One data point is not a trend.
 
TheUnicorn said:
Which doesn't affect my point, the fact that they mistook her actions is not important, the fact that Taylor didn't kill and was a valid candidate for the Birdcage.
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If you want to completely ignore the circumstances, sure. Otherwise it does affect your point, however, in that it goes from something that might happen by accident to something that threatens the Endbringer Truce.

It's not about just killing people, it's about the seriousness of crimes committed. You can be an absolutely horrible person without killing people. You can be a saviour with killing people. Attempting to argue that it's all about loss of life is disingenuous at best.

Saying "She only saw someone's face." ignores the fact that she was (seen to be potentially) breaking the truce. Which was supposed to be a big thing. You can't just gloss over that.

I'm not saying your main point is wrong (though I would and did argue there's no proper proof either way), I'm just saying you can't really use this one thing to argue your point. It's not an accurate representation of the argument you're trying to make.

Arthur Hansen said:
Canary is the only one shown in canon actually in the Birdcage that is shown to be railroaded. I don't believe that Dragon made any thoughts or comments on other prisoners that were innocent and should not have been in there. One data point is not a trend.
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Did you quote the wrong person?
 
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Arthur Hansen said:
Canary is the only one shown in canon actually in the Birdcage that is shown to be railroaded. I don't believe that Dragon made any thoughts or comments on other prisoners that were innocent and should not have been in there. One data point is not a trend.
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Don't mistake my intention here, I do think that Assault was just in it for money and his clients were monsters. I also believe that 99.999999999% of Birdcage inmates were heinous criminals, however just like in Evangelion we shouldn't discount the 0.000000001% or the Oni clause; and they ended up with a whole slew of Evas that activated.

EDIT: Besides, does anyone else think it strange that no-one questioned the existence of the Birdcage? I mean, maybe for The Faerie Queen, but everyone else put there could have been killed just as easily. This would have made billions or trillions of dollars available elsewhere, and its not like the economy was doing all that great anyway.
 
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Inv1ctus6243 said:
EDIT: Besides, does anyone else think it strange that no-one questioned the existence of the Birdcage? I mean, maybe for The Faerie Queen, but everyone else put there could have been killed just as easily. This would have made billions or trillions of dollars available elsewhere, and its not like the economy was doing all that great anyway.
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Easier to justify life imprisonment without the possibility of parole than it is execution, less controversial, too, ironically.
 
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