Jacques Portsman


 * "Jacques" redirects here. You may be looking for "Jacques Marshall", the French localization name for Neil Marshall; "Jacques Hammer", the French localization name for Jack Hammer; or "Pierre-Paul Jacques"; Max Galactica's birth name in the French localization. "Yuuki" also redirects here; please see Yuuki (disambiguation) for other uses.

"Jacques Portsman"

- How about a handshake to seal the deal?

Jacques Portsman was a prosecutor prodigy who was in charge of the investigation into a murder that occurred in Miles Edgeworth's office.

A corrupt prosecutor
Jacques Portsman seemed to his peers as nothing more than a sports-obsessed prosecutor, but he was actually an agent for an international smuggling ring. His job was to control investigations surrounding puppet corporations of the ring and conceal evidence so as to cover the ring's tracks and prevent its leader's identity from being revealed. He achieved this through forged evidence and intentionally backing out of certain cases. He rose among the ranks of the prosecutors of Los Angeles to become a high prosecutor in the late winter of 2019. Portsman was also supposed to retrieve court files related to the KG-8 Incident from Room 1202 of the Prosecutor's Building, which was the former office of late prosecutor Byrne Faraday. However, despite insisting that he wanted Room 1202 as his office, he received the adjacent Room 1203 instead, because Room 1202 was already occupied.

Interpol became aware that a corrupt prosecutor existed within the ranks of the Los Angeles prosecutor's office, but the identity of the prosecutor remained hidden. Thus, as Interpol agent Shi-Long Lang was about to arrest Ernest Amano, a fellow ring member, Portsman and his partner Buddy Faith were able to take Amano from Lang without drawing suspicion.

Mission failure

 * Main article: Turnabout Visitor

"Miles Edgeworth"

- I believe the proper phrase here is, "you fail."

The night after Amano's arrest, Portsman received a directives card from the smuggling ring's leader, ordering him to retrieve a video from the KG-8 Incident that had been confiscated from Amano after his arrest. Portsman had Faith fetch the video and two pieces of evidence intended for Amano's trial. Meanwhile, Portsman saw his chance to steal the KG-8 files from Room 1202. The basketball hoop outside of Room 1203 had by then become a staple of Portsman's office. Portsman moved the hoop to the door of Room 1202 and switched the number plates between Rooms 1202 and 1203. He then tricked the lone late-night security guard, Maggey Byrde, into opening Room 1202 for him, and then he searched for the KG-8 files. Failing to find what he needed in the office's safe, Portsman ransacked the office bookshelf and then replaced the books in what he believed was the correct order. However, Faith caught Portsman in the act, and realized that there had been more to his errand than his partner had let on. The two struggled, and Portsman grabbed Faith's revolver, and shot him in his abdomen. Portsman then wrote detective Dick Gumshoe's name in Faith's blood on some of the books and left with the video, which was stained from the gunshot. He then spent some time in the Criminal Affairs Department to establish his alibi.

Hours later, Miles Edgeworth, the resident prosecutor of Room 1202, discovered the body, and the ensuing investigation was underway. To ensure Gumshoe's arrest, Portsman barged into the office again to take over the investigation. He knelt over Faith's body as if he were mourning his death, and then he pointed out the bloody writing implicating Gumshoe. However, by then, someone else had taken one of the files on which Gumshoe's name was written, nullifying the accusation against him. Portsman thus revealed his backup scapegoat: Maggey Byrde, who had had the only master key in the building at the time. He claimed that he had told Faith about the safes that were in each prosecutor's office, and Faith had tried to rob the safe, at which point Byrde had caught him in the act and killed him. Portsman also claimed that he had been in his office the entire time. He then had Edgeworth, Byrde and Gumshoe removed from the office, pointing to them all as potential suspects.

Undeterred, Edgeworth continued his search in the 12th Floor Hallway and figured out what Portsman had done. Edgeworth reentered his office and confronted Portsman with a note that the victim had slipped under the door to Room 1203, indicating that Faith had retrieved the evidence that Portsman had wanted. However, Portsman already had his backup alibi: he had been at the Criminal Affairs Department, and he claimed that he had already read the note. Nonetheless, he was unable to keep the lie going for very long, claiming that he had been storing two pieces of evidence that Faith had given him. Edgeworth immediately had Gumshoe search Portsman for the missing third piece of evidence: the blood-stained video. After Edgeworth revealed Portsman as the murderer, the latter began rapidly biting down on the medal he wore around his neck until he finally swallowed it and fainted. Portsman was promptly arrested for Faith's murder, leaving his directives card behind, which Edgeworth mistakenly came to believe was a card sent by the Great Thief Yatagarasu.

Personality
Portsman was a great fan of sports and regularly played tennis, dodgeball, soccer, and basketball. He would spend hours training in his office. In fact, he seemed to spend far more time working out physically than studying his law books, which themselves were vastly outnumbered by shelves upon shelves of sports memorabilia, trophies, and awards in his office. His love of sport permeated almost everything he did, from having officers "pass" him evidence, to dragging a basketball hoop outside his door for practice, to exercising in his office. When working with others, he offered them a handshake to "seal the deal". When he got serious, he put on the jacket he normally had nonchalantly slung over his shoulder. When worried, he tended to chew on the medal he wore, eventually swallowing it and fainting when finally defeated.

While he came across as a cheerful and impulsive man who cared about his friends, in actuality he was a cold individual who viewed his partner as expendable. He also seemed to have been a bit of a perfectionist.

Name

 * In Japanese "Makoto" (誠人) means "truth" and "Yuuki" (優木) means "courage".


 * His English name "Jacques Portsman", is probably a corruption of "jock sportsman".

Development

 * In the Japanese version, he is voiced by Yuuki Furukawa, one of the game's planners. The character's appearance is also apparently based on Furukawa, as he too plays basketball and wears polo shirts.