Defense Counsel (legal party)

A courtroom advocacy party assembled to contest a JAG finding and argue that the android officer Data qualifies as a person. The group functions as the defense in Starfleet judicial proceedings, marshaling moral and evidentiary arguments, calling for full personnel records to humanize the defendant, and opposing the prosecution’s engineering-focused characterization. Representation includes senior Starfleet officers acting as counsel; the entity operates ad hoc within military-legal protocols rather than as a standing bureaucratic department.