A question of jurisdiction

[Skyfire]

Month 1 Week 2 Day 1; open to people in Rodimus' office

Skyfire strode down the hallway briskly, but not running--with his long legs, a brisk walk was the equivalent of a full gallop for many others. He had many questions on his mind, doubts that disturbed him all over again about the Autobots and their ethics. Doubts that he'd thought settled until he'd heard that Hook was to be tried for war crimes... and not expected to be found innocent.

There was Rodimus Prime's office; if he'd read the watch schedules correctly, the Prime should be seeing to adminstrative issues now and more or less available. Skyfire tapped lightly on the door...

[Rodimus Prime]

Actually, this time Rodimus really is playing video games.

Why not? It's 'be in the office and be available for people who want to talk' time. There's only so much 'paperwork' a robot-run ship generates when it's just chugging along, and he already looked over that!

(They should probably see about trying to get some supplies soon. Asteroid field, maybe?)

He pauses his game and looks up. "Yeah, Skyfire?"

[Skyfire]

Skyfire steps into the room and lets the door slide shut behind him. He looks more serious than usual, like he's contemplating a potentially life-threatening scientific puzzle.

"Do you have more than a few minutes? I have serious reservations about our trying Hook for war crimes, and I hope you will hear me out."

[Rodimus Prime]

Rodimus straightens, then leans back, rubbing the palm of his hand over the top of his helmet and muttering something about 'not the only one.'

He looks up at Skyfire, his own expression serious, and, louder and clearer, says, "I've got the time. What, specifically, is the issue?"

[Skyfire]

Skyfire finds himself a seat across from Rodimus and looks intently at him with those ice-blue optics.

"I don't know the Laws of War of my Cybertron--we suppressed the knowledge of our previous Great War pretty thoroughly, and that includes the customary usages for prisoners--nor of yours, but I am familiar with the basic theory of legal systems from various cultures. By what authority do we claim the right or even the jurisdiction to try Hook for anything done prior to arriving in this reality? He was not under your command or the Emirate's, and he could not have committed any crimes against either of your Autobots before you arrived here for obvious reasons. In fact, what crimes is he charged with? Being a Decepticon? That is an enemy faction in a civil war, not a crime, unless he was in direct rebellion against your legal authority, which he was not, for the same obvious reason."

Skyfire hunches his shoulders slightly. "How we treat our enemies is as indicative of who we are as how we treat our friends," he add softly.

[Rodimus Prime]

... He's asking about legal jurisdiction? When they're all still pretty much working out their legal code as they go along?

Rodimus Prime leans back and quietly taps the top of his desk, looking up at Skyfire (one of the few people these days he does have to look up to).

"Skyfire, here and now, the Autobots in this reality are my Autobots, and he's... allegedly committed crimes against some of them. We've got a survivor of one of his most heinous alleged crimes right here with us. Are you proposing we... what? Discount the mental damage done to Omega Supreme and the lives lost at Crystal City just because they weren't lost here? How many need to die in this reality before we have the authority to try him? For that matter, it seems to me that Omega, as the only surviving legal official of that crime scene, and crime is really too mild a term here, does have a fair bit of jurisdiction, although I suspect you wouldn't be too thrilled with the results of turning Hook over to him."

"The prosecution is still compiling the full list of charges, but they include genocide, attempted genocide, torture and mistreatment of prisoners, looting..." Rodimus frowns and trails off, activating his terminal in holo-mode so that a transparent screen floats over his desk. He pokes something, pulling a file up. "I'm not even sure how to classify reformatting a city against the will of its populace! Probably a crime against peace, given that it was against humans..." He looks up. "Like I said, the list is still being compiled, but I'm not going to discount the experiences of those victims we have with us just because the... alleged crimes were committed somewhere else."

[Skyfire]

Skyfire looks at Rodimus Prime sadly. "Have you considered the path you might be going down if we establish a precedent of prosecuting people for actions done in other realities, before they arrived here? How do we even know it's the same person, and not someone who looks like them from a parallel reality that is very similar? Do we punish people for deeds done by someone who looked like them? Are Autobots about vengeance? Or are we about justice, mercy and compassion? I see this universe as a fresh start for everyone, Rodimus. All that should matter is our behavior here and now. I don't believe we should carry old feuds with us; let our old universes handle their own affairs."

"The Hook I met among the Decepticons was still Cybertron's greatest cyber-surgeon, and someone who would not let a patient die if his skills could save them. He ought to be treated as an honorable prisoner of war, until such time as we work out a prisoner exchange or other arrangement--not used as a scapegoat for everyone's grievances with the Decepticons," Skyfire says.

[Rodimus Prime]

"We're not using him as a scapegoat for everyone's grievances against the Decepticons, Skyfire, but we've got people here with very specific and valid grievances against him, and I'm not going to dismiss their experiences because it happened in another reality," Rodimus snaps, annoyed.

When he speaks again, he's calmer. "Look, you're right about the fact that we're not sure that he did those things, but... that's the thing. When you have someone whom you suspect might have done something terrible, but you're not positive, you put them on trial. Getting to the truth of who did what is one of the purposes trials serve. Another purpose is deciding what to do with that person if he's found to have done those things."

He leans forward, resting his forearms on his desk to prop himself up. "Skyfire, we've got someone in our brig whom we've got good reason to believe can and has built devices for destroying planets... whole star systems, even. Are we positive that this one did it? Not yet, but again, that's the sort of thing you use a trial to establish! If we were to just give him back without first trying to sort that out, and then he goes and does similar here, we share the guilt."

He lifts his left arm, gesturing absently with his hand as he speaks. "I can't ignore what went on in our home realities when doing so puts this reality at risk, Skyfire, but we're trying to be as fair as possible about this. The judge and jury are all being chosen from realities without a Hook at all, and he's been treated well."

[Skyfire]

Skyfire processes everything Rodimus says and nods. "That sounds better... a fair, fact-finding hearing is better than what rumor has implied. Scuttlebutt had it that Hook's guilt and probable punishment were a foregone conclusion, and that we were just going through the motions. As you can imagine, I don't like hearing things like that."

Blue optics brighten like sparks at Rodimus's last few comments. "No, we are not responsible for what someone else chooses to do. I've heard the theory that potential criminals--such as 'military-build robots'--should be restrained or punished or 'removed' before they commit crimes, for the 'good of society'. 'Pre-emptive guilt' is an obscenity. Rodimus, I am capable of destroying planets; should I be put on trial, reprogrammed or executed?"

[Rodimus Prime]

Rodimus attempts to hold Skyfire's gaze directly and gives him a very solemn look. "Skyfire, so could I. All it would take is for me to let down my guard."

Then he leans back in his seat again. "However, there's a big difference between having the technical or physical ability to destroy a planet and having the emotional capability. But... that's not even the issue here. The issue is that we have reason to believe that he's already attempted to do so. If you prevent someone from committing a crime, they get away, and then you catch them later, you just don't let them go and say, 'Eh, we'll come back and pick you up when you finally manage to get away with it,' especially not when it's something on this scale! You keep trying to make the point that we should just ignore the things that went on back in our own realities and only go by what happened here, when these 'things' are multiple attempts to destroy an inhabited planet! I do not buy that, and I am not going to buy that! It's not 'pre-emptive guilt,' the guilt we're attempting to establish is very much emptive! And again, yes, I know we're not positive, and again, that's part of what the trials for."

[Skyfire]

Skyfire can actually conceive of situations where he would destroy a planet--for example, a world taken over by runaway Von Neumann machines or a Dhole infestation that threatened to spread--but he thinks better of telling Rodimus that.

"Did he just decide to do that one day on his own, or was Hook acting under orders? How punitive are we to soldiers who are required to follow orders? And then there's the whole question of reprogramming I've heard about. What if it turns out that Hook literally cannot avoid following Decepticon orders?" Skyfire asks.

[Rodimus Prime]

Rodimus has an alternate (from Skyfire's reality, no less) who did destroy a planet (or at least gave the order).

But he evacuated it first, so there's that?

"I can't answer the first question now. That's another part of what the trials for. As for the second, quite a few civilized cultures and species specifically state that 'I was just following orders' can't be used as a defense against war crime charges. In fact, Skyfire, if you really believed it could be used as a defense, I doubt you'd be in here right now asking me these questions. And do you think I'd bother answering them if I really believed in that as a defense? I'd expect you to take me at my word, no questions and no explanations needed."

"As for the third question... that does make things trickier. But if he... if he literally has no free will, that... that could be viewed as a form of insanity."

[Skyfire]

Skyfire sighs. "Some cultures do. How many cultures allow their soldiers to refuse a superior's orders on the grounds that a subordinate thinks it might be a crime? Disallowing 'I was following orders' from being a defense when not following orders is a crime as well puts the defendant in an impossible situation, you realize?"

"Still, I expect the point is moot. The larger concern I still have is this: how can Decepticon prisoners in general expect to be treated by us? Not only is how we treat our enemies representative of our values, there is a pragmatic issue: if our enemies know that they are well-treated when prisoners, they are more likely to surrender when the fight goes against them. People who know that only execution or torture awaits them will fight to the bitter end, which is far more costly to us. What is the penalty if Hook is guilty?"

Skyfire sighs again. "Having our very first captive be tried for crimes he didn't commit here sets a precedent that's going to look very iffy to any cornered Decepticons in the future. From a hypothetical cornered Decepticon's point of view, it looks like if he surrenders, Autobots will dig through his past to find something they can hang him with--so why should he surrender, instead of doing his best to take us down with him?"

[Rodimus Prime]

Rodimus slumps back in his seat, lifts his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose, and sighs. "Skyfire, I'm not talking about 'shoot the enemy in the back' level of 'following orders.' I'm talking about, 'regularly attempts to destroy inhabited planets and-or commit genocide' level of following orders. Attempted planetary destruction. Attempted planetary destruction. Attempted. Not the potential to destroy a planet full of life, the repeated attempt."

"When the charge is, 'repeatedly tried to destroy an inhabited planet,' no, I'm not really bothered by the fact that under Decepticon law, which, incidentally, we don't use as a basis in Autobot war trials, not following orders is a crime, because following those orders has the potential to wipe out all life on a planet. With something of that magnitude, I'm also not all that concerned with the sort of precedent it sets, because I do not believe attempts to destroy a planet don't count just because they happened in another universe, you will never convince me that those people don't matter just because they live in another reality, and if I have to explain that again, you can consider this conversation over." He lowers his hand and again attempts to look Skyfire directly in the eye. "I'm willing to answer questions, but we seem to be going in circles on that one."

"Now, for how he's been treated, I don't even know why you keep bringing up torture. He's been well treated since brought on board. Might be a little bored, but that's about it. I can't tell you what the penalty is if Hook is guilty because penalty is also something decided on the trial, but stasis and, yes, execution are likely options, because the charge is destroying a city and attempting to destroy a planet. Not every Decepticon would even go to trial because not every Decepticon has even done those sorts of things. Hook, we have reason to suspect, has."

[Skyfire]

Skyfire raised a hand. "I did concede that the point is moot where Hook is concerned. Do consider how it applies to future prisoners, though."

He sighed again. "Did he really try to destroy a planet? Or did he just help build the machine that Megatron tried to destroy a planet with?"