Judge Sinfield

Chief Judge Martin Sinfield is a fictional supporting character in the Judge Dredd comic strip in 2000 AD. He is Chief Judge of Mega-City One.

Fictional character biography

Judge Sinfield was the head of Traffic Division until 2120, when he was transferred to take charge of re-organising Administration. In 2131, when Chief Judge Hershey's controversial policy of granting citizenship to mutants resulted in a dramatic fall in her popularity, Sinfield was one of three senior judges who led a campaign to remove her from office in a recall election. When this triumvirate's chosen candidate, Judge Dan Francisco, was seriously injured in an assassination attempt, Francisco easily won the election and became chief judge. Sinfield's reward was promotion to deputy chief judge, and consequently he served as acting chief judge while Francisco remained in hospital, recovering from his wounds. From this position, Sinfield easily established himself as the real power behind the throne.

One of their first acts was to exile Judges Dredd and Hershey from the city for their role in promoting mutant rights. Dredd was sent to the Cursed Earth to oversee the construction of four new mutant townships which were being set up in the Cursed Earth to house the recently deported mutants.

Like many judges, Sinfield has been cloned. When Sinfield's clone, Judge March, was given his Final Assessment, Judge Rico found him wanting and failed him, incurring Sinfield's ire. In revenge, Sinfield exiled Rico to the Cursed Earth townships as well. Due to Sinfield's mediocrity, Dredd and Rico suspected that he had corruptly sneaked his DNA onto the cloning program.

Even once the new chief judge was well enough to run his own administration, Sinfield manipulated Francisco to some degree, for example by using his influence to exile Rico. Nevertheless, Sinfield did not always get his own way. He clashed with Francisco when the Chief Judge overruled his objections to spending more money on the mutant townships.

Francisco was aware that his deputy was trying to manipulate him, but he still did not dismiss him as he believed Sinfield had the city's best interests at heart. However, Francisco's confidence was badly misplaced. Sinfield was a stern hardliner on the mutant issue, and eventually he became disillusioned with Francisco's relatively compassionate treatment of mutants, and with his willingness to spend what Sinfield regarded as extravagant sums of the city's strained budget on ensuring the mutant townships were somewhat decent places to live in. Finally resorting to criminal means, Sinfield used a powerful hypnotic [...] to subvert Francisco's will, and then encouraged him to resign. With Francisco's resignation in 2132, Sinfield automatically became chief judge, and at once set AbOUT imposing harsh anti-mutant policies, such as automatic deportation for the most trivial of offences.

Not long afterwards, Judge Dredd lodged a formal complaint against Sinfield with the Council of Five, accusing Sinfield of gross negligence in failing to provide him with sufficient resources, almost leading to the death of one of the judges under Dredd's command. However, Dredd's hopes of receiving even a partially sympathetic hearing before the Council were soon dashed when Sinfield simply replaced the more moderate Council members with hardliners like himself.

Bibliography

Sinfield has appeared in the following stories:

• "Backlash" (written by John Wagner, art by Carl Critchlow, in 2000 AD #1628-1633, 2009)
• "Under New Management" (written by John Wagner, art by Carl Critchlow, in 2000 AD #1649, 2009)
• "Tour of Duty" (relevant episodes written by John Wagner, art on relevant episodes by Colin MacNeil, PJ Holden, Mike Collins, and John Higgins, in 2000 AD #1650-present, 2009-10)
• "[...], Vi and Vidslugs" (written by Al Ewing, art by Mike Collins, in Judge Dredd Megazine #295, 2010)