Courtroom Witness Stand (Witness Chair)
Detailed Involvements
Events with rich location context
The Witness Chair centers Data physically and symbolically, integrating biometric scanners and focusing judicial attention on his body; it is the immediate locus of inspection, hand removal, and collapse.
Clinical and exposed — the chair makes the witness both accessible and vulnerable to scrutiny.
Platform for testimony and physical examination.
Serves as an altar of scrutiny where identity is assessed and potentially nullified.
Occupied only by the sworn witness; physically connected to evidentiary scanners and court systems.
The witness chair is the physical locus of Data's testimony: fitted with scanners, it frames his evidence as an object of technical interrogation and makes his body a site for legal scrutiny and later, physical violation when his hand is removed.
Clinical and exposed; lights concentrate on the chair and the scanner's hum underscores the mechanized scrutiny.
Platform for testimony and biometric verification that anchors the court's focus on Data's physicality.
An altar of interrogation where the individual's vulnerability is exposed to institutional judgment.
Occupied by the witness when authorized; physical contact regulated by court permission.
The witness stand is the immediate focus where Data testifies and where personal artifacts are displayed; it concentrates scrutiny and makes the personal into public testimony under oath.
Intense and exposing — bright lights and focused attention create pressure on the witness.
Stage for testimony and evidentiary demonstration.
A small moral altar where identity and agency are publicly assessed.
Occupied by the sworn witness; entry controlled by court procedure.
The witness stand / platform serves as the immediate theatre of interrogation where Data and then Maddox are subjected to oath, scrutiny and rhetorical pressure; it concentrates moral visibility onto individual bodies and performances.
Intense and exposed: bright lights and focused attention create vulnerability for the witness and moral urgency for questioners.
Stage for testimony and cross-examination; focal point for evidentiary display and personal revelation.
A legal altar where identity and dignity are publicly examined and potentially redefined.
Reserved for sworn witnesses; positioning under judge's gaze underscores limitation.
The witness stand is the theatrical and legal fulcrum where Data and Maddox sit under scrutiny; its proximity to judge and counsel concentrates moral and evidentiary pressure, making personal testimony legible to institutional judgment.
Intensely focused and exposing — the witness stand is cold in light but hot in moral intensity.
Platform for testimony and cross-examination; focal point for the audience's empathy and the judge's decision.
Represents the individual's vulnerability under institutional gaze.
Reserved for witnesses under oath and controlled by courtroom procedures.
Events at This Location
Everything that happens here
In open court Riker methodically reduces Data to machinery: he elicits that Data was built by Dr. Noonien Soong, has massive storage and processing capacity, then stages a public demonstration …
In open court Riker stages a clinical, devastating demonstration to prove Data is property: after extracting technical testimony and bending a plasteel bar, he removes Data's hand for inspection and, …
Picard abandons technical argument and transforms the hearing into an ethical test: he summons Data, produces the android's travel case—medals, a book of sonnets, a single holocube of Tasha Yar—and …
In the courtroom's emotional crucible Picard calls Data and then Maddox as a hostile witness, producing Data's medals, a book of sonnets and a holocube to humanize the android. Picard …
In the courtroom climax Picard reframes the hearing from technical taxonomy to moral precedent, humanizing Data with medals, sonnets and intimate testimony and forcing Commander Maddox into a corner. Picard's …