[HPforGrownups] Is Dedalus Diggle important? (Re: Dedalus Diggle)

[Susan Hall]

No: HPFGUIDX 26621

I've always been concerned about the name "Dedalus Diggle".  What we know
about him from canon is that "he never had much sense" (McGonagall) that he
wore a violet top hat and bowed to Harry once in a shop, and that he is in
the Leaky Cauldron when hHarry arrives (along with a woman called Doris
Crockford - am I right in thinking that this is the name of a real life
spiritualist who wrote a book called Innocent Voices In My Ear and was
famous in the early 1980s?).

However, Diggle is a name forever associated in my mind with the well
publicised early 1990's trial for attempted rape of a Manchester solicitor,
one Angus Diggle, who escorted a girl to the Caledonian Ball at (I think)
the Savoy; they both crashed out  in the living room of a friend's flat to
await her return to Edinburgh and his to Manchester, and she awoke in the
night to find him on top of her wearing the frilly cuffs from his Highland
costume and a green condom.  fortunately, her friend who were sleeping next
door rescued her and called the police (he memorably remarked to the WPC in
the Black Maria "I don't understand.  I paid for her ticket to the ball.  I
was entitled".

Some years later, after he had served his sentence (and been struck off) he
was arrested again, for intervening as a police officer warned a prostitute
in the red light area of (I think) Leeds to move on.  He memorably said to
the police officer "Don't you know who I am, officer?"

I always wondered whether the name, the lurid clothing choices, the
Edinburgh connection and the complete absence of sense were some form of
association of ideas.

Susan