Name: Vigilante
Universe: Post-Crisis
Alter Ego: Adrian Chase
Occupation: Professional criminal hunter
Marital Status: Widower
Group Affiliation: None
Base of Operations: New York City
Known Relatives: Charles Chase (father; deceased), Doris (wife; deceased), Adam (son; deceased), Drew (daughter; deceased)
Height: 6 ft. 2 in.
Weight: 197 lbs.
Hair Color: Blonde
Eye Color: Blue
First Appearance: Vigilante #36

History:
Adrian Chase was born into a life of wealth an privilege, the only son of prominent New York attorney Charles Chase. Early on, Adrian excelled in both academics and athletics as a student at some of the country's finest schools, leading to a position on the 1960 United States Olympic Track team, and a Sigma Cum Laude from Harvard Law School three years later.

After graduation, Adrian began practicing corporate law for his father's exclusive and well-connected firm. Adrian soon grew impatient and uncomfortable in the rarified air of the rich and influential, desiring work that would get him into the courtroom and out of the country clubs.

With that in mind, Adrian sought and landed a job with a legal aid office on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Adrian's resignation from his father's firm lead to a split between the two that was to last for years. It was there that Adrian met Doris Brinkley, a young para-legal, whom he would eventually marry.

Adrian attracted considerable media attention as a young Leftist lawyer, taking up the defense of young men resisting the draft in the late 1960s and speaking out against the war in Viet Nam. Eventually, however, funding for his storefront legal aid office was cut, and Adrian was forced to seek employment elsewhere.

Gradually, like many of his turbulent generation, the revolutionary zeal of his youth began to cool. His family now included Doris and their first child, Adam, later to be joined by a daughter, Drew. Seeing in Adrian the kind of man he needed to bust the mobs' hold on the city, the Manhattan District Attorney offered him a position on his staff. Adrian accepted with enthusiasm.

Adrian's relentless pursuit of the city's criminal hierarchy won the tireless D.A. praise from the press and public but earned him many powerful enemies in the underworld. Foremost among these was Anthony Scarapelli, head of one of New York's mob families against whom Adrian was gathering incriminating evidence. With the help of Robin of the Teen Titans, Chase went so far as to flaunt the very laws they both upheld in order to harass Scarapelli into a confession. Frightened that the D.A. would indict him, Scarapelli ordered Adrian Chase killed.

A bomb placed in Adrian's apartment exploded as planned, but instead of killing him, it was his wife and children who died. Their deaths robbed Adrian of the will to continue his fight against the mobsters who destroyed his life.

While visiting the graves of his family, Adrian was approached by a mysterious woman who convinced him to follow her. They traveled west, to the middle of the desert, where the woman revealed her name to be Lynn, a member of a small cuilt of men and women dedicated to battling the same evils which overwhelmed him in New York. He was accepted into their number and, under the relentless tutelage of Lynn, Chaka, Bloody Knife, and Chastity, became an expert in all manner of armed and unarmed combat, learning how to allow his mind to overcome and heal virtually any wound inflicted on him. They helped heal his shattered soul as well as giving him the means to avenge the murder of his family.

When he was ready, Adrian left his four mentors and returned to New York. Now, when he hit the dark underside of the city, he was no longer a man seeking vengeance for crimes committed against himself. He was the Vigilante, representing everybody who has ever found the scales of justice tipped in the favor of the rich and powerful.

Vigilante took his fight to the streets of the city, widening his focus to include many criminals who habitually preyed on the weak and defenseless, including such costumed villains as the Electrocutioner, and Cannon and Saber.

Eventually, Adrian Chase began to question his motives and work as Vigilante and, when he received an appointment to fill an empty spot on the State Supreme Court bench, he realized that he could no longer continue his crimefighting. Thus, on the eve of his becoming a judge, Adrian Chase gave up his black-suited alter-ego, retiring him forever.

Someone else had a different idea, however. Within days, the Vigilante was once again on the streets of New York, this time gunning down criminals and police alike in an insane orgy of blood and violence. Adrian's good intentions had been taken and twisted beyond recognition. He felt it was his responsibility to find and stop this madman. After a long search, Adrian at last confronted his doppleganger in a showdown in which Adrian shot him. To his shock, Chase learned that his friend, Alan Welles, had suffered a nervous breakdown and been behind the killing spree. With Welles dead, Adrian believed his ordeal was over. Now all he had to do was live with the guilt of having killed his closest friend, even if Welles had not offered him any choice.

Yet a third Vigilante took up where Alan Welles had left off. This time the man behind the mask was Dave Winston, Judge Adrian Chase's court baliff. Winston felt that Adrian had created something fine and noble that subsequent troubles had caused Adrian to lose sight of, but whose true purpose he could resurrect in this latest incarnation. Ultimately, Adrian Chase realized that the only salvation of his sanity lay in washing his hands entirely of Dave Winston and Vigilante. With his girlfriend, Marcia King, Adrian left for a European vacation, which was interrupted before it could begin by a terrorist hi-jacking.

Vigilante responded to the emergency, as did the costumed terrorist fighter, the Peacemaker. In a confrontation before Adrian, Peacemaker shot Vigilante dead. That was the last straw for Adrian's unstable psyche, bruised by a year-long series of tragedies and guilt. Stripping the bloodied mask from the fallen Vigilante, Adrian once again took up the mantle of the Vigilante, swearing this time that the gloves were off.

In a subsequent fight with Peacemaker that was broadcast live on television, Vigilante was unmasked, revealing his true identity to the world. Suddenly, Adrian Chase was a wanted criminal and had to entirely give up his old life to live on the run as he continues his work as the Vigilante, waging his relentless war on crime.

Powers:
A master of all forms of unarmed combat, Vigilante is also an expert in the use of firearms and knives. He is in superb physical shape and, combined with his superior skills in the martial arts, is a formidible opponent in almost any situation.

Vigilante also possesses an advanced knowledge of certain Oriental arts and meditative processes that allow him to overcome pain and facilitate the healing of most non-fatal wounds and injuries.