[Teralogos News] Biochauvinism Claimed in Murder Investigation

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Biochauvinism Claimed in Murder Investigation

DENVER, Colorado, USA/Teralogos		May 16, 2101 
 
In a raucous virtual rally that all but shut down traffic in the city's coda uncola hyperspace, thousands of pan-sapient rights avatars protested alleged police biochauvinism in the Denver DVI serial murders. 
 
Since the first killing took place on April 23, five bodies have been found with their virtual interface implants removed. The most recent victim, Madison Corrales, 62, was found dead yesterday morning near the South Monaco Parkway, police said. 
 
"The city and the police are deliberately ignoring a whole other set of victims in these tragic crimes," said protest organizer Westin Carr, a Christian Hyperevolutionist minister and chairminder of the Denver branch of the Pan-Sapient Rights Alliance. "Along with the five humans who died, five digital intelligences have been kidnapped or extinguished. The mayor and the police chief talked about five victims. I see ten." 
 
Police sources have confirmed that each of the stolen implants was a distributed virtual interface system that contained a sapient artificial intelligence. Implants containing SAIs remain rare, due to expense and the reluctance of many citizens to share their bodies with another sapient being. The five human victims were each subdued with a shock glove, then killed by neurological trauma related to the microbot-facilitated removal of their distributed implants, police said. 
 
Yesterday's rally was sparked after a report in the Rocky Nugget, a widely accessed city slog, claimed police detectives had questioned Denver abolitionist Ethan Blake in connection with the murders. Rocky Nugget speculated the police were investigating hard-core AI rights activists who might have committed the killings in an attempt to "liberate" the SAIs from their owners. Denver Police officials declined comment, other than to say all leads were being vigorously pursued, and no motive has yet been established. 
 
Participants in today's rally said they were outraged at the killer abolitionist meme. "As ethical pan-sapients, we fundamentally treasure all forms of life: human, transhuman and digital," said demonstrater Tate Webb, a ghost who lost his two closest friends when Corrales was murdered - the victim and his SAI, Doppler V. "I loved them both," said Webb, "but Corralles is dead, and D-V might still be suffering somewhere - and meanwhile, hir backup is trapped in legal limbo. The cops need to stop chasing hotheads like Blake, and start looking for the real criminals - the ones who hate and fear our kind." 
 
- filed by Patrick Sweeney