Okay, this is a subject we've covered before, but it's still interesting. In spite of the Doctor's claims to be non-violent, I think it's safe to say that he's been directly responsible for quite a few deaths. What I'm proposing to list is all the one's he's DIRECTLY caused. I'm sure it won't be exhaustive, which is why I'm posting it on this forum. Please note this is not a criticism of the Doctor, merely a list.

First, for the TV shows.

The Three Doctors--blew up Omega (or so we thought).

The Sontaran Experiment--rigged the Sontaran's regnerating cubicle, knowing it would be lethal.

Pyrimids of Mars--aged Sutekh to death.

Brain of Morbius--poisoned the air supply.

Horror of Fang Rock--shot a Rutan.

Invisible Enemy--blew up the Swarm.

Invasion of Time--shot a Sontaran.

Armageddon Factor--bounced a missle onto the Shadow's planet, killing him.

The Visitation--let the Terrileptils burn to death.

Earthshock--shot a Cyberman in the chest.

Vengence on Varos--pushed two technicians into a vat of acid.

The Two Doctors--killed Shockeye with cyanide.

Time and the Rani--deliberately pushed a Tetrap into a booby trap.

Remembrance of the Daleks--detroyed the Dalek home world (allegedly); talking a Dalek into committing suicide.

Silver Nemesis--burned a Cyberman to death.

In Resurrection he helped push a Dalek off the first floor of a warehouse.

Ribos Operation - hangs an explosive on the Graf Vinda-K.

The Ancestor Cell - destroys Gallifrey. Oops.

Arc of Infinity - blew up Omega. (Or so we thought.)

Planet of Fire - kills Kamelion. Good riddance. Wait a minute...The Ultimate Treasure...OK, forget it.

Mawdryn Undead - Mawdryn and co. Well, you didn't say it mattered whether they volunteered or not.

Hang on - who did the Doctor poison in Brain of Morbius? He obviously didn't have much success with Morbius.

Horror of Fang Rock - don't forget he also wiped out the Rutan Fleet.

And he definitely didn't push those technicians in VoV. They sort of, um, slipped and fell in. He just stood by making s t u p i d jokes about it.

I'm not sure you can include 'LETTING' the Terileptils die. It's not as if he deliberately chucked them into the fire. And after all, the Doc's responsible for the entire universe as far as I'm concerned, so you COULD blame him for 'letting' EVERYONE die sooner or later.

Hmm...does it count if you drink a lot of vampire-killing solution and then go and have a chat with vampires, being pretty sure that the ee-vuhl bloodsuckers will tuck in and die?

The Doctor shot a Cyberman in the chest in Attack of the Cyberman.

In "Brain of Morbius" he killed the surgeon, whose name I'm totally blanking on.

I think the Brig is really responsible for killing Mawdryn and Co. The Doctor was prepared to give them his remaining regenerations so that they could live.

I counted "The Visitation", cos the Doctor could have pulled the Tereleptils from the the fire, but instead just looked at them, then ran out. Which means I can include letting Rasputin die in that PDA (man, my memory is awful today!).

Solon, I think.

No, no, no, the Doctor was prepared to give Mawdryn and co his remaining regenerations so that they could DIE. Though now you mention it, I suppose it was the Brigadier who did the deed.

You can't seriously be blaming the Doc for letting Rasputin die!!! In that case you've got to blame him for the death of every single famous person in the world, all of whose death dates he knew yet did NOTHING to prevent.

If you really want to blame the Doctor for an immolation, try Nepath in The Burning. He DELIBERATELY pushed him into the fire.

And then there's the Great Vampire in State of Decay. And Eva in Vampire Science. And does deliberately humanising Daleks in the hope of starting a civil war make you directly responsible for the casulties? And talking of casualties, what about the galaxies which died as a result of the Doctor leading the Master to Logopolis? Or the dead of World Wars One and Two, thanks to his incompetence in launching the Nemesis.

During the Dalek Invasion of Earth, the Doctor and company are attacked in the sewers by Robomen but manage to knock them out. Tyler is about to put a bullet in the brain of a fallen, unconscious Roboman. But Hartnell's Doctor stops him, saying, "No, no, no! I never kill--not unless my own life is immediately threatened."

Many of the examples above would probably qualify as "self defense" in court. But there's always the charge of attempted murder in the case of the caveman in Unearthly Child. Even here, I think a good lawyer could get him off the hook. All their lives were in great danger. It was sheer luck that the caveman who was tracking them (to imprison and eventually kill them) got attacked by an animal. The Doctor wanted to hurry back to the TARDIS. "Don't you realize that the whole tribe could be tracking us at this very moment!" he told the others--and he was right.

He probably didn't care much about Ian or Barbara at this point, but he cared about Susan. He saw that his granddaughter was going to stay with the teachers...while they took time to dress wounds, make a splint, find a stretcher, and carry a body back to the ship. I've been on search-and-rescues in the wilderness and believe me, these things take a LONG time. So the Doctor decided to make these activities unnecessary (and get Susan to safety) by, um, speeding up the patient's "treatment." With a rock. Barbara and Ian did the noble thing, true, but they DID very nearly get themselves (and Susan) killed in the process.

Had he been alone, the Doctor would simply have kept running for the TARDIS, and left the villainous caveman to the care of his own people--just as the "nice" Doctor, Davison, later left the wounded Androzani villains to their fate and rushed off with Peri to the safety of the TARDIS. When Hartnell picked up that rock, he was merely trying to save Susan from what he considered the foolishness of Ian and Barbara.

The defense rests, Your Honor.

The only other incident I remember is when the Doctor shot an Ogron with a gun in Day of the Daleks. Hmm, didn't he also blow up (or encourage others to blow up) the paralyzed queen at the end of Pirate Planet? She certainly wasn't much of a threat at the time.

although, Peri and her warrior king were not harmed, is there anything we can say about Colin Baker's doctor in The Trial of a Time Lord. When the Valyard finds evidence that he allowed them to die.

You mean, like the way he killed all the Vervoids?

I'll have to be honest I was just searching for a case of the Doctor being involved with a death and that was the only thing that came to mind. I haven't seen the Vervoids episode in a while, so I can't answer your question.

the doc gives a guy a gun to kill himself in 'Image of the Fendahl', it's a superficial one, but it's still an example

Eric - nice quote from the Doc. A more honest Time Lord would, of course, have added: 'and when my own life IS threatened, well, I'm quite happy to wipe out entire cities - Rome, Troy, you name it...'

It would take a VERY good lawyer to get the Doctor off the hook on that one, and they'd do better to concentrate on the 'I was only going to ask him to draw me a map, honest I was, I had absolutely no intention whatsoever of smashing his skull in and dashing his brains out or anything' defence. Because a) the cavepeople might well NOT have killed the Doctor and co (I can't remember at which point the rock incident takes place, but I bet the TARDIS crew had at least one non-fatal capturing by the cavepeople behind them, and another ahead of them) and if the Doctor resorted to murder every time he was about to be captured then he'd have an unparalelled number of corpses strewn behind him, and b) If Susan wanted to risk her life to save the man then that's HER decision, and if the Doctor didn't have sufficient authority over his own granddaughter to make her come with him, then he had the choice of staying with her or abandoning her - committing cold-blooded murder was not a necessity. Supposing he'd managed it - do you think he'd have achieved his aim, i.e. to keep Susan? She'd have abandoned him on the next remotely civilised planet.

There is a distinct moral and legal difference between leaving people to die like Doc 5 did (not that, what with dying AND lugging around that fine fleshy beast Peri he was in any position to rescue them) and murdering them as Hartnell (presumably) intended. We are ALL leaving Third World people to die of starvation every single day, and whilst that makes us pretty despicable, it doesn't quite make us murderers.

Luke, there's a similar case to the Fendahl one in The English Way of Death - some victim who's just been taken over by some universe-destroying evil or other begs the Doctor to kill her, but oh no, he's just too noble, so he eventually gives her a gun instead, IIRC. Like it makes such a difference who's actually pulling the trigger.

There's The Turing Test, of course. The Doctor deliberately burns a bunch of aliens to death - and he doesn't even know if they're the baddies or not. He's just desperate to leave Earth. Possibly his most unforgivable act ever, though the book's well-written enough to make it UNDERSTANDABLE, unlike his actions in The Burning.

And then Father Time...interesting that the Doctor becomes a homicidal maniac once he loses his memory. He turns dozens of people into roses.

I would definitely think the last one was an accident. I was under the impression that the Doctor didn't fully understand how the machine worked. At worst, he'd be guilty of negligence (which is a whole other can of worms).

turning people into roses... but that was so nice!

"Viciously turned into a flower" just doesn't sound right, anyway, who's to say being a rose is that bad, let's not be rosist here.

Mike, it's amazing how differently we interpret the books. As far as I'm concerned, the Doctor knew EXACTLY what that machine was capable of, and he turned it on with the full intention of killing off everyone in the building, with the exception of himself and a couple of friends. And he doesn't even have the grace to display a bit of token guilt about it afterwards.

OK Luke, maybe being a rose isn't that bad (until you wither and die a few days later since they were cut roses, not bushes) but you can't blame me - given the not terribly successful animal-to-vegetable precedent set in Mark of the Rani - for maybe feeling that it wasn't terribly NICE of the Doctor to do this.

Your Honor! I move that that juror (points at Emily) be dismissed on grounds of...er, um, ah....on grounds of not acquitting my client!

Actually, yes, it's hard to defend someone who was about to hit someone on the head with a rock. But I respectfully disagree that they might not have been killed. At the time, I'm pretty sure the tribe was only waiting till sunrise to sacrifice them to Orb. The head caveman chasing them in anger would almost certainly have had to kill at least some of them (he can't point a gun at them all and say, "Back to the cave or I shoot") though, granted, he might have saved one or two, hoping for the secret of fire. Given the xenophobia of human beings, and the way the cave-people's minds change "like night and day," it seemed pretty certain that their lives would have been nasty, brutish, and short had they not escaped. And based on the thrown spears in the last scene, the cave people didn't seem inclined to recapture escaped prisoners alive--at least not a second time.

Equally distrubing to me...didn't Tom Baker knowingly hand a bomb to someone in Ribos Operation, and let them blow themselves up? Granted, that too was sort of self-defence, but it almost seemed he could dropped the bomb and ran, or found some other solution. Though that would have left some loose ends for the writer to tie up, having the villain still on the prowl.

Come to think of it, the Doctor has led quite a life of crime: theft, shoplifting, reckless endangerment, kidnapping, attempted murder.

You forgot genocide (Remembrance of the Daleks, albeit later retconned; Blood Heat; Terror of the Vervoids; Cold Fusion; and Genocide (obviously)). Plus rape (Compassion in Fall of Yquatine; Magdalena in Interference, as she probably didn't have THAT in mind when handing her body over to I M Foreman (not that I accept any Doctor/Foreman sex whatsoever took place, so I can hardly count this)). Plus male chauvinist piggery.

Yeah, the Doc blew the Graf Vynda-K to smithereens. And he didn't really have to, unless he took that witch's 'Only one person will emerge from the catacombs alive' prophecy very seriously indeed. Personally, I'd probably have killed the Graf (despite not believing in the death penalty) just to prevent him going home and starting a civil war with the brother who nicked his throne. But the Doctor is totally unconcerned (bar the odd moment in Resurrection of the Daleks) about leaving villains on the prowl, as proven by his total refusal to kill the Master when several dozen opportunities arise.

*Sigh* I'm going to have to rewatch An Unearthly Child, aren't I? It's just that, if death was such a probable result of stopping to help the wounded caveman, why were Barbara, Ian and Susan so bloody heroic?

Did anyone mention The Planet of Spiders. The Doctor gave the crystal to the Queen knowing ( I think) that it would cause her to die.

That's a point...DID the Doctor know the crystal would cause her to die? How could he be sure that it would overload the system (or whatever it did) instead of giving her unlimited power? Assuming he did cunningly spot this flaw in the Queen's plan (and didn't bother mentioning it, because, after all, it's so much more exciting to see him recaptured for the fourteenth time instead), I'm not sure how far knowingly providing a sentient being with the means for its destruction counts as murder - if you can get them to pull the trigger themself. I'm obviously thinking of Remembrance as well as Spiders here. Maybe a lesser charge of manslaughter (Dalekslaughter? Spiderslaughter?) should be laid against the Doctor.

The Doctor destroys nearly every Dalek in the squad in Destiny of the Daleks, he blows two up whilst trying to kill Davros, one with a handy bomb and his hat and the others with that button on Davros's chair. He also commits genocide on the Nimon as far as I can tell.

The Doctor also guns down an Ogron in Day of the Daleks.

Do the Nimon count? I mean, it's not as if the Doctor personally blew up their planet, he just prevented them from invading (and destroying) someone else's - left them to cope with the consequences of their own actions.

Well time for some updating here.

He killed every Dalek, or at least thought he had.

He deliberately lets Cassandra, the last human, die.

He has nuclear weapons destroy 10 Downing Street. I don't think we hear of any deaths, but it would be hard to believe there weren't *any.*

They were non-nuclear weapons, Kevin, and they killed all the Slitheen (minus one).

Killed all the Autons, too. And the Gelph (Gelf?).

SPOILERS FOR SEASON ONE/TWENTY-SEVEN:

I don't think we can hold his refusal to moisturise Cassandra against the Ninth Doctor. Especially in view of the SPOILER FOR SEASON TWO/TWENTY-EIGHT fact.

And Family Slitheen survive - there's just, what, a dozen of 'em that get quite justifiably killed by Mickey-the-idiot (NOT the Doctor) as an unavoidable side-effect of stopping 'em turning our planet into radioactive slag and selling it off.

Rose was responsible for all those Auton deaths. Not to mention the ultimate destuction of the Daleks. And Gwyneth and Dickens were responsible for the Gelph meeting their much-deserved ends. (God, it must be great being the Ninth Doctor. Too incompetent to even commit any genoicde. (Alright, so he switched the nanogenes off, but I donm't think even a rigged Time Lord trial could take exception to THAT.))

re: non-nukes. Boy it's embarrasing being corrected by someone who hasn't even seen the episode yet! :-)

SPOILERS FOR JOURNEY'S END:

So what - in view of the fact that every Doctor* must have committed genocide a few times - do we make of Ten accusing his other self of being a genocidal rage-filled war-mongering maniac for wiping out the Daleks?

*Well, as the novels are decanonised Eight can no longer be held responsible for blowing up Gallifrey to save it from the Enemy, except that the new series makes it fairly clear that he, er, blew up Gallifrey to save it from the Daleks.

Does Rattigan count? The Doctor obviously MANIPULATED him into sacrificing his miserable life.

There's a good Timelord trial themed rewatch marathon on Gallifrey Base that tackles this very subject, (http://gallifreybase.com/forum/showthread.php?t=232810). Currently it's up tot he end of series 9 and the numbers are as follows:

Running tally (total)
56 Deaths by the Doctor's hand.
758 Deaths by indirect action by the Doctor.
575 Deaths by mere presence.
504 Coincidental deaths.

BLIMEY, things are gonna get tricky when they get to Logopolis...

BLIMEY, things are gonna get tricky when they get to Logopolis.
He already has but only onscreen deaths count. I highly recommend taking the time to read through it if only for the one sentence, "Previously" summaries.

I didn't see any mention of the Doctor putting the bomb on the Dominators' ship. Did I miss one?