Battlestar Galactica (TV Series)

Collaborators (2006)

Richard Hatch: Tom Zarek

Quotes 

• Laura Roslin : [Scolding Zarek for his ordering secret trials/executions for collaborators]  If they're guilty, they'll be tried by a jury of their peers.

  Tom Zarek : They have a jury, but they don't get lawyers. They don't get to showboat for weeks and months on end. They don't get to blame the system. And the don't get lasting fame as martyrs or innocent people just in the wrong place at the wrong time. They just disappear. Now. In the great twilight between the long night of the occupation and the dawn of a new era, you come into office clean, without their blood on your hands.

  Laura Roslin : Well, thank you, that's-uh, that's very poetic, however you have a problem, Mr. President. Everyone, by law, is entitled to a trial with representation. Everyone. It is not an option to be discarded at the president's whim.

  Tom Zarek : You think by making the trials public that you'll find justice?

  Laura Roslin : Yes, I do.

  Tom Zarek : Come on, Laura. You're not that naive. Let me tell you what's gonna happen if those cases go to trial. It'll consume this fleet for months, maybe years. People will be lining up to testify against their neighbors. It'll be a circus, an entertainment for the mob, and you will be signing death warrents almost every day. Is that how you want to spend your next term, Laura? As Executioner-in-Chief?