Complete Monster/Ace Attorney

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

 * Manfred von Karma, the Big Bad of Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney. 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 thus ruining the lives of countless possibly innocent defendants in the process, until defense attorney Gregory Edgeworth managed to (rightfully) 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. Unfortunately, right after the end of the case, an earthquake hit the building. It trapped Gregory Edgeworth, his nine-year-old son Miles, and a bailiff named Yanni Yogi inside an elevator. As oxygen was beginning to run out, Yogi panicked and attacked Gregory, prompting young Miles to throw a piece of evidence from the trial at them to get them to stop fighting, which turned out to be a gun. The gun fired once, a terrible scream was heard, and then everyone passed out from lack of oxygen. Unbeknownst to the people in the elevator, von Karma had come across them. The bullet from the gun shot through the glass and hit his shoulder, causing him to scream. In revenge for the marring of his record, von Karma picked up the gun and shot the unconscious Gregory in the heart. This instigated the case known as the DL-6 Incident, where 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 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) 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. 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.
 * A minor point, but von Karma was legitimately unaware of the fact that the particular piece of evidence that Gregory objected to was illegal. This does not change the fact that he had and continued to use other pieces of falsified evidence.
 * 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 Hawthrone, 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 19 year-old girl who would never hurt a fly to commit matricide or tricking her 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 used her 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 Blaise Debeste, the corrupt chairman of the Prosecutorial Investigation Committee (as well as the former chief prosecutor) who gleefully drops casual death threats, suckers defendants into making plea bargains only for him to screw them over by sending them to rot in prison for life, and makes a living auctioning off crucial evidence on the black market. Blaise sided with the Bigger Bad of the story to assassinate the real president of Zheng Fa years ago and killed the reporter that witnessed the murder. Later on, he killed the reporter's girlfriend and framed Kay for it. He also gave Manfred von Karma the only penalty he ever got because he was caught forging evidence, despite the fact that Blaise helped von Karma with the evidence and is thus partially responsible for the DL-6 incident that shortly followed, with Gregory Edgeworth's death, Yanni Yogi's life being ruined, and Miles Edgeworth's horrible upbringing all indirectly resting on his shoulders. Additionally, he blackmails many characters in the series to work with him if they value their lives which include tampering with the crime scene and hiding crucial evidence. He even blackmails the judge Justine Courtney to get her to work against Edgeworth because he kidnapped her adoptive son. And let's not get started with the trauma he puts his son Sebastian through the entire game, who he constantly berates and tells in the worse way possible that all his achievements were because of his connections (and knowing that Bansai has a lot of connections with shady folks, one can only imagine what would have happened if they didn't comply) and not from Sebastian's hard work. Later on, he kidnaps his own son (but, to be fair, he was aiming for Courtney's son), and when Sebastian finally snaps out of his Heroic BSOD thanks to Edgeworth, when he tries to confront his father, he proceeds to humiliate his son even more in court to the point of disowning him in front of many people. And to top it off, it's hinted that he has both murdered his own wife and sexually abuses his son.

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 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 slipped into a coma and almost passed too. 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 killed Athena Cykes' mother Metis when she was only 11 years old, in front of her no less, and ended up getting Prosecutor Blackquill convicted. 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, an Ill Girl), the aforementioned Prosecutor Blackquill, and an astronaut 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.