Slave Court Ch. 02

Anyway, the actually useful parts of the testimony were over. Soon after, I retreated for deliberations.

This was the first case of the day that posed an actual challenge of jurisprudence. On the face of it, the slave had never disobeyed any order, just as he claimed. Legally, while only the husband had *ownership* of the slaves, the wife too had legal *possession*, just like she had legal possession of the house and could legally allow other people to enter it, even though only the husband was the legal owner. Therefore, of course, the slave had to obey both his master and his mistress, though the master had priority as his legal owner, but *only when he was around*. So, in fact, legally, no active disobedience had occurred. However, one had to fault the slave to a minimal extent, for failing to disclose the goings-on to his master. At least implicitly there was insubordination, since he knew damn well that his master had wanted to know.

Therefore, I delivered the following verdict, after I had returned to the courtroom: Both slaves were guilty of disobedience to an extent only trivially above the one, which would have rendered it a matter for purely domestic discipline. Therefore, I sentenced the slave woman to two days of torture and the man to two weeks, in addition to the two days he had already received for contempt of court. Knowing all too much about their domestic situation, I made use of my judicial prerogative to have the two days - in the man's case, the first two days - carried out by the court.

"Bailiff, take both of them downstairs. Have both of them given forty strokes with the bullwhip on their back and behind. Then, organize fifty male state slaves and have them gang rape both of them, until all fifty are completely spent. After that, put them in the chair for the rest of the time," I said, referring to replicas of the witness stand, in which the convicted would receive shocks of medium strength at randomized intervals once or twice a minute, until they had paid their debt to free society. Or, in the man's case, one eighth of his debt, the rest to be settled through the tender mercies of his owner.

I banged my gavel, and thereby washed my hands of this entire dysfunctional household.