The Open Society Justice Initiative wrote in a report on the trial, "Duch's behavior at trial again displayed a desire to be seen as exceedingly cooperative with the court, as if he were attempting to exchange his old role with that of the perfect defendant." A particularly telling moment, the report continued, "occurred when Duch thanked expert David Chandler for praising his professionalism in running S-21, seemingly still believing that professionalism in the running of a torture and execution camp was a high compliment."

Out of hundreds of hours of testimony from prison survivors, experts, and Duch himself, a clear and unnerving portrait of him emerged: this killer of thousands was, above all else, a good student. It seems to have been this quality, rather than greed or blood lust or even pure revolutionary fervor, that drove him to manage operations at S-21 so carefully, so meticulously, that only a handful of prisoners survived.

That's why everyone was stunned when, on the 77th and last day of his trial, Duch took on the most unlikely role of all: the bad student.

When called upon to give a final statement, he abruptly abandoned Roux's strategy of remorse and, and instead demanded that the court release and acquit him. Duch's behavior and public statements up to this point had been as good as a guilty plea, and his trial had seemed to be headed toward a predictable ending: a commuted sentence in exchange for cooperation, contrition and conversation.

But instead of apologizing once again to his victims, he launched into a dry, technical discourse on the history of the Communist Party in Cambodia and its leaders--which did not include him. He said that as he was not a senior leader he could not have been "most responsible" for crimes committed at S-21. He asked to be acquitted in the name of national reconciliation--the favored buzzword here for the process of integrating former Khmer Rouge cadres into Cambodian society.

Stunned judges asked him to clarify his statement. He obeyed: "I would like the chamber to release me."

Duch subsequently fired Roux and tried to replace him with a Chinese lawyer who understood Communism (Defendants at the tribunal, which is jointly administered by the Cambodian government and the UN, have the right to one local and one international lawyer). When a Chinese defender could not be procured, he engaged a second Cambodian. Together, the new defense team has pursued a one-note legal strategy: insisting over and over again that Duch was a mid-level cadre and therefore should not be prosecuted.

In July 2010, the tribunal found Duch guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, sentencing him to 35 years in prison. (Due to mitigating circumstances and time served, he will spend less than 19 years in jail; prosecutors have called this figure "manifestly inadequate.")