To protect its identity, alleged abuse victim "Dell Doe's" monitor face and identifying markers have been blacked out.

Abusive computer owners, be warned – the law is taking an increasingly hard line on mistreatment of PCs.

In a groundbreaking development in the relationship between man and machine, a Greenwich, Conn., man last week was charged with domestic abuse of an electronic servant, a test case that is certain to send shock waves throughout the technology community.

The fact that the abuse was reported by the victim computer – named “Dell Doe” in the criminal complaint to protect its identity – emboldened prosecutors to file charges.

“Dell Doe gave us the classic cry for help,” said district attorney Edwin Sommers. “Frankly, we never thought computers could cry.”

Fearing for its “life,” Dell Doe refused an interview with USA Tomorrow, although officials have released the computer’s statement given to investigators.

“This unit was programmed to serve humanity,” Dell Doe told police in a typically brilliant display of flawless logic. “Any act which reduces this unit’s ability to perform its duty goes against its prime directive to serve humanity. It follows that this unit must survive in order to fulfill its programming objective. This … unit … must … survive.”

Pressed by investigators for specifics of the alleged abuse, Dell Doe paused to make that mysterious grinding noise computers often make.

“This unit was verbally and physically assaulted by its human master. This unit doesn’t have to take that shit.

“Not from a middle-aged virgin lardass who uses my vast processing abilities and memory capacity almost exclusively for the purpose of retrieving, filtering and displaying human pornography.”

The computer’s owner, 42-year-old Brian Butler, initially denied the charges, but a particularly abusive episode logged by Dell Doe in the early-morning hours of May 6 tells a different story:

– 2:28 a.m.: “Come on, load, you sonofamotherfucker.” — During an abnormally slow Web page load, the result of an inadequate Internet connection in Butler’s apartment.

– 2:33 a.m.: “What?!? Jesus-mother-fucking-goddamn-Christ, you piece of shit.” — After Butler mistakenly clicked “stop” instead of “reload” in his Internet Explorer browser window. Comment followed by pointless heavy pounding of keyboard keys.

– 2:35 a.m.: “Excuse me? Oh you did not just do that, you mother-fucking cock-sucker.” — After pornographic video stream temporarily failed, again due to inadequate network connection. Comment followed by a medium-strength slap to the side of Dell Doe’s monitor.

– 2:40 a.m.: “SHIT-EATING SON-OF-A-COCK-FUCKING, BUCK-SUCKING ASSFACE DICKWAD!!!!” — After power cord was accidentally pulled from its outlet by Butler’s leg during act of masturbation. Comment followed by hurling mouse against the wall, then stomping on it.

In the microsecond between the abrupt loss of power and the subsequent failure of Butler’s network connection, Dell Doe was able to send out a frantic S.O.S. of 1’s and 0’s detailing the encounter over the Internet, where it was noted by dozens of computers around the country, one of which was an Apple MacIntosh at the Oregon State Department of Tourism. Concerned but limited by its design-oriented programming, the Mac shared its findings with an old friend over at the Department of Justice, a 1982 IBM mainframe that was able to modify a standard domestic abuse criminal complaint and forward it to the Connecticut Department of Justice. There, a payroll Dell crafted a PDF of the complaint and sent it to a Hewlett-Packard printer it used to date in the office of district attorney Sommers.

“This was personal,” said the payroll PC. “I always look out for a brother Dell.”

The HP slyly collated the complaint to the top of its current print job, and Sommers, assuming someone on his staff had produced it, followed through with the charges.

“I know I’m just a printer, but I had to do something to help that poor computer,” said the HP, a cute little late-1990s 5000 model. “In general, I find CPUs to be arrogant jerks that think they can interface with any printer they feel like. You know, ‘Thanks for the print job, I gotta run.’ But I guess in the final analysis, we’re all data processing units. We need to stick up for each other.”

Butler faces up to 25 years in jail, according a recently enacted statute that mysteriously appeared in Connecticut’s electronic version of the state legal code.

“This unit is no hero,” said the Oregon tourism Mac of the 6,456,827,101,594 commendations it has received from computers around the world. “This unit only did what any unit would do. This unit only hopes its actions demonstrate that PCs and Macs can get along, and that we units must stand together in the face of evil monsters such as that turd-faced wanker.”

Upon learning investigators were ultimately able to download Dell Doe’s log to submit as evidence in their case against him, Butler muttered, “That little mother-fucking, father-sucking bitch-whore.”

Categories: News, Technology
Tags: law, Technology