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Karma Taser

No OBJECTIONS to this guy's qualifications!

Some of the Amoral Attorney crowd in the Ace Attorney series cross the line into incredibly immoral types, due to their own actions and those of the evil people they represent. Warning: since these are mystery games, abandon all spoiler-avoidance hope, ye who enter here!


Original Trilogy[]

  • Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney:
    • Case 1-2, "Turnabout Sisters": Redd White is the flamboyantly narcissistic CEO of Bluecorp, a company that specializes in "buying and selling information"—which translates to the systemic blackmail of hundreds. Redd White holds the lives of hundreds of people in his sway with his industrial blackmail, such as the Fey clan, whom he ruined by exposing their part in the DL-6 investigation, and Marvin Grossberg, whom he's turned into his tormented stooge for 15 years by threatening to leave him to the police for his role in the DL-6 catastrophe. Redd has ruined so many lives he's driven a sizable amount of people to suicide, to the point it takes up the largest space in the evidence folder Mia Fey compiled against him. Redd personally murdered Mia because of this, attempting to frame her younger sister Maya for it. When Phoenix Wright comes onto the case, Redd attempts to frame Phoenix for Mia's murder as well, after physically assaulting the young attorney while gloating to his face that he can and will get away with such acts because everyone is too afraid to ever cross him given his power and influence.
    • Case 1-4, "Turnabout Goodbyes": Manfred von Karma, the Big Bad, is an absolutely ruthless prosecutor who cared more about winning cases than serving justice. Manfred had a flawless, decades-long win streak thanks to using every dirty trick in the book to ensure a guilty verdict and ruining the lives of countless defendants in the process, until defense attorney Gregory Edgeworth managed to have von Karma penalized for his illegal workings in the courtroom. Although Gregory still lost the case, von Karma was enraged by the black mark on his previously perfect record. In retaliation for this, von Karma shot the unconscious Gregory in the heart in the fallout of an earthquake and power outage that hit the courtroom. This instigated the case known as the DL-6 Incident, where the baliff Yanni Yogi ended up falsely accused of murdering Gregory but was ultimately acquitted but his life was left in shambles in the aftermath. Afterwards, von Karma took Gregory's young son Miles under his wing to raise as his own and, for fifteen years, he groomed, molded and shaped Miles to be the antithesis of everything that Gregory Edgeworth was, twisting the boy to fit his views and become a ruthless, cold-hearted prosecutor who cared for nothing but getting a guilty verdict every time. Purely for revenge against Miles' late father and to have someone else (other than his own daughter Franziska) to carry on the von Karma prosecutor legacy. Years later, before the DL-6 case was to closed forever, von Karma set up a murder by manipulating Yanni Yogi's desire to take revenge on the people who'd ruined his life (his old defense attorney Robert Hammond and Miles Edgeworth, who he believed was the real killer in that case) and pinned the blame on Edgeworth, intending to have his own foster-son locked up and executed for a murder he didn't commit because Edgeworth's two losses to Phoenix Wright made von Karma consider him a liability to his career. Worst of all, though, is that he'd also had Miles convinced that he himself was the one who had killed his own father and planned on the guilt over this eating at him to the point where he would confess to and be charged with that murder as well, just in case the Frame Up didn't pan out. When Phoenix Wright and Maya Fey find out that von Karma masterminded the murder that he'd had Edgworth framed for and confront him about it, von Karma assaults them both with an electric taser which he admits could potentially kill them (pictured above) so that he can take away all the DL-6 case evidence and the letter he wrote to Yanni Yogi that could prove his guilt, and it was only through Maya saving one vital piece of evidence that ended up used against him in court later that his schemes were thwarted, at which point von Karma threatens to kill Edgeworth during his Villainous Breakdown. While he claims his actions are for the sake of ensuring criminals are punished, von Karma proves himself to be simply a narcissistic hypocrite willing to commit any atrocity for the sake of the "perfection" of his record.
  • Despite never lifting a finger to kill anyone himself, Matt Engarde in Justice For All is widely considered to be among the most evil people within the entire franchise for good reason. There is no motive given for the atrocities he committed (outside the murder he had Shelly de Killer carry out), leading some to believe he did it all For the Evulz. These atrocities include throwing away his manager Celeste Inpax (who he knew had feelings for him) like a used tissue, and when she fell for his rival Juan Corrida and got engaged, he told him that he was previously intimate with her in the hopes this would cause him to call off the wedding. It worked: Celeste Inpax was so heartbroken that she committed suicide and as a result Engarde was overjoyed. Of course, he doesn't just stop there. When he found out Corrida plotted with his new manager, Adrian Andrews, against him, he hired Shelly de Killer to kill his rival, but still puts in extra plans to blackmail the assassin despite De Killer having nothing but absolute trust in his client. Knowing that he'd be the prime suspect for Corrida's murder, he had de Killer kidnap Maya and starve her so that Phoenix Wright would become his defense attorney and get him acquitted for his crimes, having de Killer threaten to end Maya's life if he didn't. His actions also led to de Killer shooting Franziska von Karma in the shoulder so that she wouldn't prosecute against Engarde, and Detective Gumshoe risking his life in order to secure the location Maya was being held at. In the last trial, he made it so that Phoenix had to PIN the blame for Corrida's murder on Adrian, already an insecure, miserable woman with dependency issues who'd attempted suicide in the past. The kicker for this is that Engarde probably knew all that about Adrian and still did it for extra lulz, relishing the idea of making her suffer more and forcing the morally upstanding Phoenix to compromise all of his beliefs in truth and justice by condemning a woman he knew to be innocent in order to get acquitted a man who'd admitted his guilt to his face in the Detention Center earlier. Ruining lives and viewing people as toys he could break and dispose of after he was done playing with them, Engarde was among the vilest and most sadistic psychopaths that Phoenix Wright ever faced in his legal career.
  • Dahlia Hawthorne, Big Bad of Trials & Tribulations, shows just how dangerous judging a book by its cover can be. No other villain in the series cackled with delight at the prospect of forcing a teenage girl who would never hurt a fly to commit matricide or tricking her all but shouted to be mentally-disabled first lover into a suicide pact that she had no intent on fulfilling so she could avoid getting caught. She later poisoned Diego Armando, the lover of attorney Mia Fey, when he got too close to her crimes, before going on to seduce Phoenix Wright when the two of the attended college together just to use him as her personal evidence disposal and was planning on eventually disposing of him. Dahlia then forced her far gentler twin sister Iris to date Phoenix in her place, but when Iris started falling for Phoenix, Dahlia accelerated her plans to poison him. When an ex-lover of hers tried to warn Phoenix, Dahlia electrocuted him to death and tried to frame Phoenix for his murder. Despite being convicted and executed for her crimes instead, Dahlia returned as a vengeful spirit aiding her mother Morgan Fey in a plot to kill Dahlia's cousin Maya solely to spite her elder sister Mia's spirit. Taking steps to manipulate her twin sister again to help with the murder, she came back from the dead to possess Misty Fey (albeit due to Misty's desire to protect her niece Pearl from being taken instead) and attempted to murder Maya, being stopped only by the intervention of Godot (formerly her victim Diego Armando), who killed her host in order to get rid of her spirit. Despite this she became convinced that she'd forced Maya to murder her own mother and caused her to commit suicide, which she gloated about to her opponents' faces when Maya channeled her spirit in court later on. She's also a ginormous hypocrite; she shows nothing but disgust towards Morgan because of the "petty revenge" that she was after, but at the same time, Dahlia was going along with Morgan's plan specifically in order to get her own revenge on Mia. A thoroughly malicious and spiteful sociopath and a Serial Killer with a high victim count whose evilness far transcends any plausible justification for it, Dahlia Hawthorne gave new meaning to the term "demon with the face of an angel", and stands as one of Phoenix Wright and friends' cruelest and most deeply personal foes.

Investigations Games[]

  • Investigations has Quercus Alba, the corrupt ambassador of the country of Allebahst and the head of a large smuggling ring whose criminal activities have resulted in the country of Zheng Fa being driven to economic ruin. The other criminals of the game (except Lance, though his dad IS one of Alba's lackeys) answer to this guy. He is the one who ordered the deaths of Cece Yew, Deid Mann, and Byrne Faraday and killed Mask*DeMasque II and Manny Coachen with his own hands (well, with a statue and a knife, but you know what I mean). His reasons for these killings are as follows: Cece Yew and Deid Mann were witnesses who needed to be silenced, Byrne Faraday was a member of the Yatagarasu whose goal it was to expose his operation, DeMasque II was going to steal his fake statue and, with it, some plates used for a large-scale counterfeiting operation, and Manny Coachen because he ordered DeMasque II to steal it. Manny ordered the theft because he was planning to betray and usurp Alba and was unaware that the fake statue had been switched with the real one. He almost gets away with it due to Diplomatic Impunity, which is why confronting him and getting him to admit to his crimes proves...difficult.
    • Arguably, the worst part about Alba is not so much his killings or even the reasons for them, but the fact that under his facade of a kind old man lies a sociopathic monster who has no remorse or regard for human life, which Edgeworth is disgusted by. In his own words, the question of if all lives hold meaning "Doesn't even warrant an answer."
  • Investigations 2 has the elderly Psychopathic Manchild Exelsius Winner, the corrupt chairman of the Prosecutorial Investigation Committee (as well as the former chief prosecutor), whose cruel nature has led to the corruption of the justice system. A self-proclaimed sadist and bully, Exelsius's greatest joy has always been ruining lives with his prosecution tactics, boasting that he has sent hundreds of people to life imprisonment after pretending he would offer them a plea bargain. Blaise has fabricated evidence, faked autopsies, and framed innocents for decades, abusing the prosecution system so freely that he hosts Black Market auctions of important evidence. Exelsius is the one who drove Manfred von Karma to murder by tricking him into using a fake autopsy to send an innocent man to prison, only to then penalize the perfectionist von Karma for fun. A dreadfully abusive father to his son Eustace, Exelsius has abused the boy for years and tried to mold him into a perfect prosecutor, responding to Eustace's repeated failures by bullying and berating him into a total breakdown, telling him in the worst way possible that all his achievements were because of his connections (and knowing that Exelsius has a lot of connections with shady folks, one can only imagine what would have happened if they didn't comply) and not from Eustace's own hard work. Having helped murder the President of Zheng Fa to empower his body double to take his place, Exelsius also helps murder reporter Alf Aldown to cover it up, and later kills Alf's girlfriend Rosie when she comes seeking revenge. Exelsius then tries to frame an amnesiac Kay Faraday for the killing, and when he is eventually exposed for his many crimes, Exelsius tries to kidnap the judge's son and threaten him with death to get away scot-free. He ends up abducting his own son instead, and when Eustace finally snaps out of his Heroic BSOD thanks to Edgeworth and he tries to confront his father, Exelsius proceeds to verbally tear down the poor young man even more in court, to the point of disowning him in front of many people. And to top it off, it's even hinted that he either killed his own wife/Eustace's mom or sent her to jail.

Apollo Justice Games[]

  • Kristoph Gavin in Apollo Justice. When one of his clients summarily dismissed him after a game of poker, he took it rather personally. So personally, in fact, that he didn't just ensure the man's case was lost - he got the lawyer defending him (Phoenix Wright himself) disbarred using some evidence that he had ordered forged for his own trial, then tipping off the prosecution that it was a forgery. This, on its own, would only qualify him as a Magnificent Bastard, but there is more to the story. There were several loose ends to clear up, including the defendant's disappearance. First, he staged an attempted kidnapping of the actual forger - a sheltered, timid twelve-year-old girl by the name of Vera Misham - and when it left her too traumatized to go outside, he stopped by and gave her a good luck charm in the form of a bottle of clear nail polish...which had a painful, extremely virulent, slow-acting poison in it. Kristoph had noticed her habit of biting her nails when nervous, so surely that would take care of her if she was ever pressured about what he'd had her make. He took great pains to make sure her father Drew would die as well by placing a stamp with the same virulent poison on it and ensuring that he'd have to use it in order to send a specific letter. And as a result, Drew died and the now-nineteen year old Vera not only was blamed for it, but she slipped into a coma after biting her nails and thus ingesting the poison in it, and almost passed too. (and if Apollo fails to get her free, she WILL die rather than be sent to jail) He also murdered Zak Gramarye/Shadi Smith in cold blood over a seven year old game of poker that Kristoph had lost. He then meticulously kept tabs on everyone who had been involved with the case for seven whole years to make sure nothing went wrong - including befriending the man whose career he had ruined. And if that man hadn't been Phoenix Wright, he probably would have gotten away with it all.
    • What really seals Kristoph's status as a monster is that he is like a combination of Dahlia Hawthorne and Quercus Alba: he cares nothing for anyone else but himself, he sees other people only as tools, and he will carry out whatever atrocious deeds he feels serve his own interest. And he's not just completely without remorse, but disgustingly smug about the lives he ruined due to his machinations.
  • The nameless spy known as the Phantom, who spends most of the game impersonating the late detective Bobby Fulbright in Dual Destinies, is extremely nasty and the second figure (after Kristoph Gavin) responsible for ushering in “The Dark Age Of The Law.” He started off by disguising himself with a mask he found and killing Athena Cykes' mother Metis when Athena was only 11 years old, in front of her no less, and ended up getting Prosecutor Blackquill convicted in a desperate attempt to protect Athena from being blamed. Before that, he killed the real Detective Bobby Fulbright and assumed his identity. He also sabotages a national symbol of pride, known as the HAT-1, a rocket, almost killing the astronaut on board. He also killed Apollo's best friend since junior high, Clay Terran, because Clay almost revealed his identity. If that wasn't bad enough, he's ruined the lives of several people besides the aforementioned Athena Cykes and Prosecutor Simon Blackquill and is indirectly responsible for almost every murder in the game, including setting off the bomb in the courtroom that was thought to be the work of Ted Tonate, which could have caused massive amount of death. Oh, and he framed two girls (Athena and her best friend, the Ill Girl Juniper), the aforementioned Prosecutor Blackquill, and Clay's fellow astronaut Solomon Starbuck for his crimes. To top it all off, if you count the murder done by his associate, Ted Tonate, he has the highest death toll of the entire franchise. He's not sorry for any of this, folks. What's really disturbing is that nobody knows his true identity. He also doesn't feel emotions the same way "normal" people do. Because of this, he is a chillingly realistic version of a sociopath in a video game.
    • A nasty little detail that really emphasizes his monstrous nature is the fact that he gets to serve as Blackquill's handler while the disgraced prosecutor takes a case. He uses this as an excuse to tase the hell out of Blackquill under the pretense of over-enthusiastically keeping a convicted killer in line. In reality, this serves little purpose but to kick an innocent man who's already endured horrible suffering when he's down.
  • In Spirit of Justice, the heartless and egomaniacal Ga'ran Sigatar Khura'in is the figure responsible for ushering in the kingdom of Khura'in's equivalent to the Dark Age of the Law. A woman born to the royal family yet possessing no spiritual power, Ga'ran was passed over for the throne in favor of her kind and gentle sister Amara. Jealousy and hatred towards Amara led to Ga'ran making an attempt on her life by setting her residence on fire. In the chaos, Ga'ran murdered the musician Jove Justice and left his infant son to die, then went on to frame the lawyer Dhurke Sahdmadhi for Amara's death. In the wake of the queen's assassination, Ga'ran's actions led to the passing of the Defense Culpability Act, which would force defense attorneys and anyone associated with them to suffer the same fate as the accused, which led to the deaths of thousands of innocent defendants and lawyers alike, and in the present day lawyers are all but extinct and the accused are helpless against the prosecution. In the meantime, Ga'ran is keeping Amara hidden away and forces her and her son Nahyuta to cater to her every whim on threat of ruining her daughter Rayfa's life. Ga'ran, finding out that her husband Inga is planning to overthrow her, without hesitation kills him and frames Dhurke for it. During Dhurke's trial, Ga'ran takes up the role as the trial's prosecutor and wastes no time in doing the damnedest to win the trial and get anyone who showed support for Dhurke executed under the DC Act. When it becomes apparent that Dhurke isn't the murderer thanks to Apollo's efforts, Ga'ran tries to throw Amara under the bus and has her shot when Apollo proves otherwise. When the court reconvenes, Ga'ran forces Nahyuta to take the fall instead, and, once backed up against the wall by Apollo, she passes a law that makes standing up to her punishable by death and tries to have him, Phoenix, and Nahyuta all executed on the spot for defying her.

The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles[]

  • Adventure: "Jezaille Brett", real name Asa Shinn, is in truth a sadistically xenophobic assassin sent by the justice system of Britain, one of the most important members of the main conspiracy in the game, and the most despicable of them. Already known as an assassin in the dark corners of London, Brett was hired by Mael Stronghart to assassinate every person who escaped the guilty verdict from the cases of Barok van Zieks, with a total of 16 victims killed in numerous "accidents", effectively being the one who made him into "The Reaper of The Bailey". Later on, Brett would be sent to Japan under a fake identity to be a student of John Wilson, only for her to assassinate him with an agonizing, undiscovered poison, and later shooting the corpse for Ryunosuke Naruhodo to take the fall. When Brett was pulled to the trial of the murder, she would make racist remarks against the Japanese throughout the trial, and at one point, break an important piece of evidence just to laugh about her untouchable superiourity. Taking pleasure in the pain of others, including those of her own ethnicity, Asa demonstrates how low the British could go in terms of hating other races.
  • Resolve: Mael Stronghart, the Chief Justice of England, is the one responsible for all of the major events in the duology. Originally a regular prosecutor with grand ambition, Stronghart blackmailed Klint van Zieks into assassinating other nobles, including the previous Lord Chief Justice, causing the infamous "Professor Killings". Stronghart orchestrated the trial against Genshin Asogi for Klint's crimes by manipulating many members of Scotland Yard's police into faking evidence, while also faking an execution sentence to supposedly let him free, only to convince his friend Seishiro Jigoku to shoot him when a bystander witnessed his escape. Later, Stronghart created an organization of assassins to kill anyone who escaped the guilty verdict, which would follow Barok van Zieks for years, and have him be known as "The Reaper of the Bailey". Eventually, Stronghart would want to ascend into the higher position of Attorney General, so he planned to blackmail Seishiro into both of them sending assassins to kill targets from their respective countries who knew "too much" of his involvement with any of the other conspiracies. Although Stronghart claims to have done it all in the name of making Britain into a better country, the heroes call him out on his hypocrisy, and Stronghart would in the end admit that all of his crimes and affable persona are just because he liked everything to run like a well-oiled machine.

Other Media[]

  • Ace Attorney 2012 film: Manfred von Karma, while hiding under a polite exterior, proves to be just as vile as his game counterpart. To maintain a perfect win streak, Manfred has falsified and concealed evidence for years, murdering Gregory Edgeworth when he attempts to find proof of this. When Mia Fey is on the verge of solving said murder, known as the DL-6 Incident, Manfred hires the reporter, Redd White, to murder her. Later on, he sends a letter to Yanni Yogi, the suspect of the DL-6 Incident, detailing a plan to murder Robert Hammond and how to frame Manfred's adoptive son, Miles Edgeworth for it. When Phoenix finds out there's a connection between the DL-6 incident and the Robert Hammond murder, Manfred has Redd White poisoned to death to ensure Phoenix can't get information from him. He then intends to have Miles be declared guilty for the murder of Gregory. While he claims that his actions are for the sake of ensuring criminals are punished, von Karma proves himself to simply be an arrogant hypocrite willing to commit any atrocity for the sake of his reputation.
  • Farewell, My Turnabout 2016 stage play: Matt Engarde shows himself to be even worse than his already-loathsome original incarnation. A famous idol-turned-television star with a bitter hatred for fellow actor Juan Corrida, a few years ago, Matt had set about to ruin Juan's life by tricking Juan's fiancée Celeste Impax into getting raped, ruining her reputation with the public and convincing her to commit suicide. Having Juan killed years later to cover up his impact on Celeste, Matt plans to blackmail his own assassin Shelly de Killer in an attempt to hold one over him, while having him threaten the life of Maya Fey if Phoenix Wright doesn't acquit him of Juan's murder and declare his manager, Adrian Andrews, the culprit.
  • Turnabout Musical (2016 version):
    • Redd White is the smarmy CEO of Bluecorp who uses his information company to blackmail hundreds. A smug, controlling businessman who has the entire country in the palm of his hand, White threatens politicians, policemen, and lawyers with exposing their secrets if they don't follow his orders. With his ego resulting in the suicides of hundreds whose lives he's ruined, to which he remains apathetic towards, White had many years ago launched a smear campaign against the police in order to get attorney Marvin Grossberg to serve him lest he reveal his involvement in the failed DL-6 case, which also ruined the lives of the entire Fey clan. With Mia Fey planning to reveal his corruption to the press, White personally kills her and attempts to frame Mia's sister Maya and Phoenix Wright himself for the murder.
    • Manfred von Karma is the same monster he is in the game, but manages to be even crueler. For years, von Karma has been working as a prosecutor, using underhanded tactics to maintain his perfect winning streak, not caring if the defendants are guilty or not. When defense attorney Gregory Edgeworth ruins his perfect record, Manfred murders him. Manfred then adopts Edgeworth's son Miles and raises him to be as ruthless a prosecutor as he is. Von Karma then manipulates a man whose life was ruined by Gregory's murder into committing murder and framing Edgeworth. Manfred later attacks Phoenix Wright and Maya Fey with a stun gun in order to steal evidence, gleefully shocking Phoenix several times after he's knocked out. When Edgeworth is found innocent, von Karma tries to get him executed for Gregory's murder, before attempting to kill him himself.
  • Conflict of Interest (Ace Attorney fangame): Carlo Luciano is a vicious and vindictive assassin who worked for the Rivales Family. Killing numerous people for his employers, Luciano helped Francisco Mendirez butcher the Cadaverini Family, faking his death with the help of Mendirez when Michael Rivales ordered him killed. Upon Mendirez trying to kill him in a fit of paranoia, Luciano dedicated himself to making him suffer for his betrayal. Impersonating Mendirez after he becomes the head of the family, Luciano kills Cody Hackins and attempts to have Maya Fey assassinated, forcing Mendirez's allies to take the fall for these crimes in order to make them think that he betrayed them. Luciano later kills three people and frames Mendirez for the murders to get him sent to jail as the final part of his revenge to ruin his reputation. When Phoenix reveals Luciano's crimes to the court, Luciano takes Detective Watters hostage and tries to kill Phoenix.