Bellatrix and the Crucio

[Eric Oppen]

No: HPFGUIDX 94716

It occurs to me that one reason Harry might not have been punished for
trying to Crucio Bellatrix Lestrange is that she is, as an escaped Azkaban
prisoner and known, avowed DE, an outlaw.  The Wizard World is
old-fashioned, almost medieval in some ways, and may well have kept outlawry
around after it disappeared in the Muggle world.  It was not what most
people seeing the word and thinking of its incorrect use in modern times
think it was.  In its correct context, it is not just a synonym for a
criminal.

To clarify---a _real_ outlaw is literally _outside the law,_ and not
entitled to any protection at all.  It is a crime to conceal an outlaw, feed
one, or help an outlaw in any way.  Anybody catching an outlaw can do
anything they want---usually meaning killing, but I doubt that medieval law
would have minded a nice, cozy torture session as a preliminary to the
slaughter.  If we practiced outlawry now, and I saw an outlaw on the street,
I could literally kill him on the spot and face no charges whatsoever---once
it was established that the person I had killed was an outlaw, I'd walk scot
free.

Outlawry was inflicted as a punishment in Viking and other Old Germanic law
codes, and had parallels (not quite the same) in Roman and Greek law.  In
Viking and medieval Scandinavia, one could be outlawed for a period of time
or for life.  In practice, this generally meant that the outlaw would go
into exile, to a place where the law-code of the people who had outlawed him
did not reach.  (This was why Eirikr the Red went off and discovered
Greenland---he'd been outlawed in Iceland for a few years on account of a
few killings.)

Now, we have seen that Barty Crouch, Sr. authorized the use of the
otherwise-forbidden-for-use-on-humans Unforgivable Curses on Death Eaters.
Was that law, or rule, ever repealed?  I could make a case that known DEs,
or at least known Azkaban escapees, are outlaws subject to "shoot-on-sight"
rules, and that this covers Harry for trying to Crucio Bellatrix.

Come to it---if known DEs are outlaws, that would have to make Voldemort
one---which would make killing him no murder at all.  That would be a bit of
a load off Harry's mind---if he wasn't basically so Nice.

--Eric, who thinks that with his anger issues, he could have Crucio'd
Bellatrix to a crispy critter with no problem whatsoever.