 What motivates people like Zeckler to commit such crimes as he committed?
He drew his carefully tailored Terran-styled jacket closer about his shoulders, shivering as his eyes avoided the black, yawning cell-holes they were passing. There was a startled gasp from within, and a skinny, gnarled little man suddenly appeared in the guard's light, like a grotesque, twisted ghost out of the blackness. Why, I've been in here for years—" "Look, Zeckler, the name is Meyerhoff, and I'm not your pal," Meyerhoff snapped. "These overgrown teddy-bears don't know what brotherhood means, nor humanity, either. I've got three million credits sitting in the Terran Consulate on Altair V, just waiting for me to walk in and pick them up. No, nothing so simple for you. And the Terran Consulate isn't willing to sell all the trading possibilities here down the river just to get you out of a mess. "You've committed the most heinous crime these creatures can imagine, and they're going to get you for it if it's the last thing they do. Trading brought scalpers; it was almost inevitable that where rich and unexploited trading ground was uncovered, it would first fall prey to the fast-trading boys. They spread out from Terra with the first wave of exploration—the slick, fast-talking con-men who could work new territories unfettered by the legal restrictions that soon closed down the more established planets. The first men in were the richest out, and through some curious quirk of the Terrestrial mind, they knew they could count on Terran protection, however crooked and underhand their methods. But occasionally a situation arose where the civilization and social practices of the alien victims made it unwise to tamper with them. Altair I had been recognized at once by the Trading Commission as a commercial prize of tremendous value, but early reports had warned of the danger of wildcat trading on the little, musty, jungle-like planet with its shaggy, three-eyed inhabitants—warned specifically against the confidence tactics so frequently used—but there was always somebody, Meyerhoff reflected sourly, who just didn't get the word. "If you hadn't been so greedy, you'd have found out what a chunk of land was to these natives before you started peddling it. You'd have found out that they're marsupials, and that two out of five of them get thrown out of their mother's pouch before they're old enough to survive. You'd have realized that they have to start fighting for individual rights almost as soon as they're born.
 New interplanetary laws created more incentive to commit crimes in vulnerable areas than they offered protection from such crimes.
 New interplanetary laws created more incentive to commit crimes in vulnerable areas than they offered protection from such crimes.  Representatives from the Trading Commission set up an operation to hire and arrest con men in order to secure resources without being indicted.  The interplanetary laws made it easy for wealthy corporations and entities to prey upon those they considered less civilized and intelligent.  The Trading Commission offered monetary compensation for whoever was willing to secure unexploited trading ground on neighboring planets.