"When a Hologram Commits A Crime..."

[DaveJohnson 0]

“When a hologram commits a crime…”

A Log by Lt David Johnson

Assistant Engineer – U.S.S Republic

 

 

Dave sat in the Republic lounge writing his repair report on the deflector array on one of the shuttles. He found it hard to write the report because there was something else on his mind, something that disturbed him greatly. Less than two hours before he had a conversation with Joy about Holly, the nature of sentience and why she couldn’t be, “Punished,’ for her actions on the DS9 holosuite when she had appeared as an alligator in the Peter Pan scenario and had almost killed him. Oh sure, the holodeck safety protocols had been on and there was no guarantee that the, “Holly Gator,” would have actually eaten him but after learning a great deal about her and the trouble she had caused on Republic in the past he chose to believe the former, rather than the latter. But, that wasn’t really what disturbed him.

 

Whether she had actually intended to kill him or not Holly had in his opinion committed a crime by making a threatening action against him. So, now the question was, when a hologram commits a crime, should they be punished for it, as any flesh and blood being would be. Joy had explained to Dave that Starfleet had exempted her from the laws of the federation because of her nature which meant that even if he went to the President of the Federation, he would not order Admiral BluRox to punish her. It also meant that she had, in essence been given carte blanche to torment Dave and the rest of the crew without fear of retribution.

 

Dave had spoken with Lt Commander Jax about a plan he had to reduce Holly to nothing more than a holographic puppet by stripping her of her violent subroutines using a program designed by a colleague of Dr. Lewis Zimmerman’s. Jax said she would take his plan under advisement and discuss it with Admiral BluRox but he wasn’t holding his breath. After speaking with Joy he was all but convinced that the Admirals hands were either tied by Starfleet or that Holly had established a bond with so many of the crew as Joy had told him that the Admiral wouldn’t want to authorize such a procedure.

 

As Dave sat at his table, sipping his Vulcan red wine and looking at the stars he thought about all the artificial beings that Federation citizens had created over the years. The Soong type Androids. The Mudd type Androids like Joy, and countless holographic characters. Most of these holograms were not considered to be sentient and therefore not responsible for any actions that they took because, with the safety protocols on, they were harmless, even if they were holographic representations of violent people. But, there were holograms like Holly that had the ability to adapt to such settings and harm or even kill people. Those holograms were shut down and decompiled. But, Holly remained in the Republic’s databanks and Dave had to wonder. Would it take the death of a Republic crewmember, perhaps even his own to make Starfleet realize that because of her nature, Holly should be considered sentient and responsible for her actions.