Jenny wrote: <It didn't say he *had.* It said he dreamt of it when in his prison cell. Which rather suggests that he's criminally minded, and wants to commit crimes. Including violent ones, it seems.>
That's still no proof - none whatsoever - that he was arrested or convicted of killing anyone.
<We don't know the circumstances under which Avon kills the visa seller, and Avon at least had a motive. Doran shoots two unarmed people and jokes about it-- again, more the action of a habitual killer than someone killing because they have to.>
None of which is relevant. Avon still killed the man - he says so himself (and I doubt of even a corrupt judiciary would take 'he tried to turn me in as I was trying to buy illegal visas' as a defence) - but his conviction was for something else. Quite possibly, he was never suspected or arrested for the murder, and there's no reason to assume that Doran was either.
<A man kills one guard and has an implant in his head (which doesn't even seem to stop him killing, or getting into states in which he might kill)?>
The limiter is clearly both very rare (we don't see it anywhere else, none of the others have ever heard of it before) and seemingly prone to malfunction - it doesn't work very well.
My guess is that it was an experimental thing, and that prisoners were allocated to the experimenters to work on. Scientists in Nazi Germany were allowed to carry out all kinds of experiments on prisoners, and I can see the same sort of morality working just fine in the Federation. But to test something designed to stop people killing, it would make sense to trial it on prisoners known to kill - and it's quite in character for them to target those convicted of killing state functionaries (police, politicians, troopers) as an added turn of the punishment screw.
Surely a lot easier to give him five to ten? And why give him a limiter and send him to a prison planet, where he's not likely to be a danger to Federation guards? Were they worried he was going to be a danger to other prisoners perhaps?
Jenny
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In the episode 'Orac' Ensor says that Orac's key is a simple on-off switch (at a guess some sort of circuit-breaker equivalent - speaking non-technically). Vila's lock-opening skills would include a basic knowledge of computer functions on a practical level (and perhaps this is why Avon is so snide about Gan - he is effectively computer illiterate). Even if Avon pocketed Orac's key automatically he might expect Vila and Zen to be able to 'patch something up.'
Alternatively, Avon might have expected Vila and Cally to think back to when Blake did something similar in 'Trial' - and that if they did not, Zen would tell them anyway.
Though he probably did expect to be in a position to get in touch with the Liberator within the specified period - and even Servalan was not aware that the 'cloud' was active - whether it was 'cleaning fluid' or something else.
The Links and Moloch might be different because they were 'evolved' with different intents - the 'ancestors' of Moloch wanted to be ignored (simplistically) and to have a better interface with computers, while the Federation (assuming they restarted the experiment on Terminal once it had been moved to its new location) might have aimed at something else. Or - is there a passing nod to the Eloi and Morlocks in HG Wells' 'The Time Machine'?
It would be interesting to know when the Teal-Vandor war games were set up - the Federation might well have 'borrowed' the technology of the sensor net in an attempt to create the limiters. The Federation in selecting subjects for limiters might well have divided 'violent criminals' into two groups - the ones which were persistently so (eg the crimos and Doran) and those who 'acted violently in a specific set of circumstances' - which Gan (seemingly) was (even if his actions were directed against the 'police'). The Federation were attempting to ensure the latter group could be reintegrated into general society - but the limiters did not 'work.'
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Sally Manton