Responsiblity for Black's death

[logic_alley]

No: HPFGUIDX 80067


The way I see it, responsibility for Sirius' death falls like this:

1) Bellatrix Lestrange -- she killed him intentionally

2) Voldemort -- he ordered his followers there and presumably let 
them understand they were to kill to obtain the prophecy.  He is 
also the one who lured Harry to the Ministry, causing those people 
who care about protecting him to come after him.   

And really, we could stop right there.   No one bears more blame 
than Bellatrix and Voldemort.    However ...

3) Sirius - he voluntarily brought himself to place, and engaged in 
battle.   He didn't have to, but I don't fault him for doing it.  He 
came to save Harry.  Sirius was supposed to stay at headquarters to 
protect himself from capture.   He is allowed to make the choice to 
put himself at risk in order to save Harry - that's his free choice 
and there is no evidence he was selfishly putting the Order at any 
greater risk by doing it.  Voldemort already knew Sirius was with 
the Order.  

He may have also been responsible because he taunted Bellatrix to 
hit him again.   We don't know really because we don't know exactly 
what killed him.   Did he let his guard down?  Was he careless?  Or 
is she just really good?   Who knows?  

I don't see him being grossly irresponsible though.  In coming to 
the Ministry he was no more irresponsible than any of the other 
rescuers, all of whom were at risk and could have been killed.  

Sirius also bears responsibility because he didn't have to give 
Harry a mysterious wrapped package - he could have just said "here's 
a way to communicate with me, I'll always carry it".  That would 
have thwarted Voldemort's ruse and prevented the encounter at the 
Ministry. 

4) Dumbledore - Yes, he is to blame because he mishandled everything 
in OOP and left Harry to make decisions without full information.  
The resulting decisions were bad ones.   No one should have ended up 
at the ministry fighting for the prophecy and Dumbledore had the 
ability to prevent it.   I don't get his behavior.   I see why he 
didn't want to talk to Harry, but why not tell someone else to talk 
to Harry?  Why not have a reliable watch on Harry all the time?  I 
see no other explanation than that he screwed up big. 

5) Harry - because he made a stupid decision to not open Sirius' 
present for irrational reasons ("I'm not going to be the one who 
gets Sirius to leave safety") - and if he had just opened it, he 
would have known he had a better way of communicating that might 
well have prevented Voldemort from luring Harry in the way he did.  
Opening the present wasn't the same as using it.  It was a really 
bad decision with bad consequences.  


But after #1 & #2, we are doing a lot of blaming the victims.   Yes, 
everyone's actions have consequences, but this was murder, not some 
kind of accident.  Two people (Bellatrix and Voldemort) acted with 
intent to kill.   They are the ones truly responsible.      

-- Logic Alley --