Dee Vasquez

Dee Vasquez was the high-ranking producer of The Steel Samurai: Warrior of Neo Olde Tokyo as well as other shows produced by Global Studios. She had ties to the local mob, which she used from time to time to get rid of people. She was a witness in the murder of actor Jack Hammer.

Death of Manuel
In 2011, Dee Vasquez witnessed a fatal accident involving action star Jack Hammer and a fellow actor named Manuel. Vasquez was producing a show starring Jack Hammer, but during a fight scene, Hammer accidentally pushed Manuel onto some sharp fence tips, killing him. Someone took a photo of the incident, but he was silenced by Vasquez's mob. Vasquez later used this photo to blackmail Hammer into doing what she wanted, including working on kids' TV shows as villains for petty change.

Murder of Hammer

 * Main article: Turnabout Samurai

Five years later, Vasquez produced the TV show The Steel Samurai: Warrior of Neo Olde Tokyo, starring Will Powers as the Steel Samurai and Hammer as the villainous Evil Magistrate. By this time, Hammer was fed up with the blackmail; he donned Powers's Steel Samurai costume and confronted Vasquez in Studio 2 of Global Studios, intending to kill her. However, the ensuing fight ended with his death on the same fence that had killed Manuel; a fanboy witnessed the death from a hidden area.

Vasquez transported Hammer's body by truck, with the help of the director of The Steel Samurai, Sal Manella, to Studio 1. There, she dressed Hammer's body in the Evil Magistrate costume, burned the Steel Samurai costume, and called the police; the police determined that Powers had killed Hammer with the Samurai Spear, which was a part of the Steel Samurai costume.

Phoenix Wright represented Powers in court; during his investigation of Global Studios, he confronted Vasquez in Studio 2 and learned about Manuel's death. Vasquez tried to use her mob to eliminate Wright, but Detective Dick Gumshoe entered the scene in time to rescue Wright.

Wright eventually got Vasquez to testify in court about her alibi. He convinced Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth to force Vasquez to testify further, which resulted in Wright exposing a contradiction in her testimony and implicating her as the real killer.

Vasquez is the only killer in Phoenix Wright's cases whose crime is manslaughter (or even arguably a self-defense killing) rather than murder, which may mean that she does not receive the death penalty. This seems to be confirmed when the judge asks where Vasquez is after she had been revelaed as the real killer, Edgeworth says she has gone to the waiting room. Usually, after a witness had been revealed as the killer, the prosecutor then informs the judge that said witness had been arrested.

Personality
Vasquez was generally very calm and rarely got angry, even when she was indicted for Hammer's murder. She also treated Manella like dirt, but he didn't seem to mind. She has a low voice.

Name

 * Her name possibly derives from the word "diva".


 * In Japanese, her last name "Himegami" is made up of the characters for "Princess" and "Goddess". Her name can further be broken up into "megami" which would mean "Goddess" whereas the "Hi" could refer to a different kanji which is read as "hi", meaning "fire", perhaps an allusion to her smoking.


 * "Sakura" is traditionally known as the cherry blossom, which is seen as a noble and beautiful flower, and she is stated as being very beautiful.


 * "Vasquez" may come from "vacuous", referring her apparent lack of attention. Or it also may come from the Spanish surname "Vázquez"

Development

 * Originally Vasquez's character was to be male, but was changed when one of the designers pointed out that all the criminals were turning out to be men.