Frank Castle (Earth-21399)

"They laugh at the law. The rich ones, they buy it. They twist it to their whims. The others, they think they've got nothing to lose. They don't give a shit about themselves or others. They think they're above the law or outside it. They know that the only thing the law is good for is keeping good people in line. And they all laugh. They laugh at the law. 'But they don't laugh at me."

- The Punisher's '''manifesto

Military Service
Francis David Castle enlisted in the United States Marine Corps straight out of high school. Serving in Iraq and Afghanistan for four years with distinguished heroism, Castle retired at the rank of Gunnery Sergeant and returned home to New York City, where he took up a new job as a police officer, married his high school sweetheart, Maria Signore, and fathered two children with her: daughter Lisa and son Frank, Junior.

Becoming the Punisher
During Frank's first year in the NYPD, he was approached by a representative of local mob boss Silvio Manfredi. They attempted to recruit Frank into their ranks with promises of wealth and prestige, but Frank flatly refused their offer. He found his attempts to bring Manfredi to justice hampered by other officers on the force who were already on the mob's payroll, and so set out to expose the internal corruption on the force. In fact, Frank was such a nuisance to Manfredi that he became the mob's biggest target.

One fateful day, Frank took his family out for dinner in the Upper West Side when a trio of masked hitmen walked into the crowded venue and opened fire before fleeing the scene. Maria and Junior died on the scene, while Lisa died shortly after arriving in the hospital. Frank suffered serious injuries, but miraculously made a full recovery.

During the subsequent investigation, Frank offered to identify the shooters under oath, but he was blocked from doing so by the other officers on the force on Manfredi's payroll, who bribed the judges not to accept Frank's testimony as admissible evidence. As a result, the case was quietly swept under the rug. This was the final straw for Frank – the law had failed him and his family. After the funeral of the Castle family, Frank resigned from the NYPD and disappeared for two months. The Manfredi crime family believed they had ended the threat to their reign.

They couldn't have been more wrong. When Frank resurfaced, he did so with old military equipment in tow, including ballistic armor with white skull symbols spray-painted over the chest, hell-bent on punishing those who got away with the murder of his family.

Abilities

 * Hand-to-Hand Combat
 * Weapons Training
 * Knife Fighting
 * Marksmanship
 * Investigation
 * Interrogation
 * Tactician