Unforgivables and Aurors (wasRe: Whether or not Fudge is a Death Eater...)

[ssk7882 <skelkins@attbi.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 52077

Ginger wrote (of Crouch's measures):

> I can see giving the Aurors those powers under the circumstances. 
> We had an unfortunate incident in my town a week ago where an 
> officer was forced to kill when he was attacked. If Aurors, as 
> trained law enforcement officials, are not given this authority, 
> the attacking DE has all the advantages. It would be like sending a 
> cop to a drug bust with no gun.

There's no reason to believe that the Aurors didn't have the right
to kill in self-defense even before Crouch came along.

This is what Sirius says in "Padfoot Returns," Ch. 27 of GoF:

"The Aurors were given new powers -- powers to kill rather than
capture, for instance."

Note what Sirius is actually saying.  He does *not* say that what 
Crouch authorized his Aurors to do was to kill in self-defense.  
For all we know, they already had that authorization.  Recognition 
of self-defense as an acceptable legal justification for killing is 
very common, after all, even if the burden of proof may vary widely 
from culture to culture.

No, what Sirius actually *says* is that the Aurors were given 
authorization to kill *rather* than to capture.

This is serious.  What it means is that the Aurors were permitted to 
kill not only in self-defense, nor even in the immediate defense of 
others.  They were allowed to kill as an *alternative* to arrest.

In other words, they could kill innocent citizens -- people only 
suspected but not yet actually *convicted* of any crime -- without 
being held accountable for it.

Note also what Sirius has to say about Moody:

"I'll say this for Moody, though, he never killed if he could
help it.  Always brought people in alive where possible."

Indeed, the text gives us an example of the sort of situation in 
which it was *not* possible: the combat with Evan Rosier, who chose 
to fight rather than to surrender.  But for all we know, Rosier's 
death at the hands of the Aurors might have been perfectly legal even 
before Crouch came into power.

The implication that I see in Sirius' commentary about Moody above is 
that there were other Aurors who, unlike Moody, were *not* killing in 
self-defense.  Nor were they killing only when it was impossible to 
apprehend a suspect by other means (Moody himself brought more Death 
Eaters to justice than any other Auror, we are told, so clearly 
refraining from the AK was really not all that crippling a 
disadvantage).  

No.  They were killing *gratuitously.*  

And Crouch's measures were what allowed them to get away with it.


Elkins