The hate machine

Len got onto the couch and activated his link. "Let the judgment commence!"

The accused was a young woman. She was accused of robbery.

The prosecution was a fat man, a store owner. He didn't look like a healthy member of society.

"Now, the evidence please!"

It was a video clearly showing the woman taking a magazine from the rack and leaving the store without paying. As it was, If you went by the video alone the woman would be as guilty as sin.

But video data could be tampered with. And there were numerous times this had actually been done, and only later been found out about.

The video also didn't show any other customers, So no witnesses then. You couldn't prosecute without witnesses, and there usually had to be more than one at that.

If this had been in any other court than his it would have been thrown out right there.

Len focused on the woman's face, her profile showed a notice that she had a sexual harassment charge lined up for the case after this one. Sorry darling, only one case at a time, you know the rules.

It said other things about her in general. But all he was seeing was that face, it seemed so uncertain of itself. He could work with that.

"A question for the accused!" He shouted to the link. It was all a game to him, he enjoyed his judgments. Of course he wasn't the only judge present but there were ways around that little problem. Judges were human too. Or so he liked to think of anyone other than himself.

And humans could be played.

He allowed himself one last vicious  grin before composing his face and stepping up from the couch and waved his hand in front of the link; the AI knew him well enough by now to know he meant for it to start.

The scanner analyzed his body and the projector spread a hologram over the room. The lounge transformed into a court room and his body turned into that of an old wizened man.

Amanda, the girl being tried saw a figure appear before her, slowly building itself up from strands of light. It formed an old man, gray bearded with friendly wrinkles flowing from his eyes and a dimple forming from a slightly lop sided grin. His eyes sparkled with a seemingly genuine friendliness.

Amanda relaxed when she saw those eyes, even though she knew that the person standing before her would look different in reality, it was still good to see someone that at least seemed friendly for once. Even her sister never smiled.

One more time she took a nervous glance at the surrounding and at the somber figures. All of them looked old. Amanda knew most of them were much younger. They were those that had the patience of youth with limitless time on their hands.

But the alter ego used in court rooms all were of the archetypical wizened old man. Amanda even knew that her rare female friends appeared in that guise when attending the halls of justice. Maybe even some of her friends were in this very room, not that she would know with the disguise they all wore.

The man had been standing there in the middle of all this. He was studying her from the tip of her head and back down to the tips of her fingers, curled as they were on the bench.

His clasped his hands behind his back and hunched his shoulders. Then his face turned sour, as if what he saw in her was something much worse than he expected.

"Miss Amanda. May I call you that?" His voice still so filled with friendliness that he had stepped into the court with that Amanda nodded before she could think.