DD trust in Snape again. WAS: Evil Hermione

[houyhnhnm102]

No: HPFGUIDX 154935

AD:

> I suppose a better word would have been "patronage", but 
> I mean "protection" as well.

> Not from Azkaban, not directly, but Dumbledore's continuing 
> assurance that Snape is a good guy, once you scrape off the 
> grease and the snark, keeps him employed, and gives him 
> (one presumes--we've seen little of his social life) entrée 
> into circles other than Lucius Malfoy's

houyhnhnm:

Only DDM!Snape would have any reason to scoff at Lucius 
Malfoy's patronage. Malfoy's *known* status as a former 
Death Eater doesn't seem to have impaired his standing 
in the WW at all.  He appears to have been able to buy 
his way in anywhere. At the time of PS/SS, he was still 
on the Hogwarts board of governors.  His influence at 
the MoM (as per Fudge and Umbridge) appears to have been 
considerable right up to the time he was caught in the 
Department of Mysteries. 

AD:

> Well, as I pointed out to Pippin, McGonagall certainly 
> knows something discreditable about the Half-Groomed 
> Prince. Unless she really holds a grudge from when Severus 
> was a student, I assume it's his record as a Death Eater.

houyhnhnm:

As of the end of HBP, she did.  We just don't know for 
how long she was aware that Snape had been a Death Eater.  
It is possible that Dumbldedore discussed Snape's past 
with the Hogwarts faculty when Snape was hired, but there 
is no evidence to that effect.  We see no sign from 
McGonagall that she is supicious of Snape, pre-HBP, for 
anything other than using Slytherinesque tactics to secure
the house cup for his house.  As far as we know, she 
knew nothing of Snape's former involvement with LV until
he revealed his Dark Mark to Fudge in GoF.


AD:

> Let's suppose you're right, then, and Snape's past is 
> known to relatively few people. In that case, even an 
> investigation that satisfies Dumbledore could be a disaster 
> for Snape. If rumors of his past get out as a result of the 
> investigation, then you may see families refusing to allow 
> their children to be taught by a Death Eater. Even 
> Dumbledore's patronage may not be enough to protect Snape's 
> job, in that case

houyhnhnm:

And I still haven't see any convincing argument as to why 
Snape would have come under anyone's suspicion if Harry 
had been bucked off his broom.  Had Snape not been muttering 
a countercurse, whatever Hermione's suspicion at that point 
whether of Snape or merely that *someone* was hexing the 
broom, she would have swept on past Snape with her binoculars 
and come to Quirrell. And she would have seen that he was making 
intense eye-contact even if his spell was non-verbal if she
really knows a hex when she sees one.

AD:

> I don't know if British wizarding law allows double jeopardy, 
> but let's assume it does not. If so Snape is safe from retrial, 
> but if he is seen to have lost Dumbledore's confidence, again, 
> his world and his opportunities dwindle alarmingly.

houyhnhn:

I see no evidence that Snape was ever tried once.  Although 
I am no expert on the law, Britsh or American and certainly 
not wizard law, in the Pensieve it seems we see the Wizengamot 
functioning in three different ways.  In the case of Karkaroff, 
it seems to be functioning as an investigatory body.  Ludo Bagman 
appears to be the defendant in a jury trial.  In the case of 
the Lestanges and Barty, Jr., it seems we are witnessing a 
sentencing hearing.  From what Dumbledore said at Karkaroff's 
hearing, it sounds to me as though Snape may have appeared 
before the WW equivalent of a grand jury, but due to DD's 
evidence was never indicted and, therefore, never tried.