In defense of DD WAS musings on Dumbledore - Even Longer/Campbell myths

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 158792

Magpie wrote:
<snip>
> I believe almost everyone has agreed that Dumbledore is in no way 
> SOLEY responsible for Sirius' imprisonment, so why does this keep 
> coming up?  I you're flabbergasted by the "hatred" expressed toward 
> Dumbledore I'm equally amazed at why anyone thinks blaming the 
> victim or pretending Dumbledore was just a simple schoolmaster when 
> we know that's not the case is going to make Dumbledore seem so much 
> better to people.  Sirius' state of mind is yet another thing that 
> JKR uses to show why Sirius rotted in jail for so long--but it still 
> comes down to the same thing it usually does in this world, which is 
> that he "looked guilty" and they felt little reason to look further.
> 
> For all the reasons you've given for Dumbledore to think Sirius 
> looked guilty there are equally logical reasons for Sirius to not 
> have gone to Dumbledore after breaking out of jail.  Those arguments 
> are actually far more backed up emotionally than ones for Dumbledore 
> not caring to know the details of what really went down, in fact.  
> Someone in jail for over a decade for a crime he didn't commit has 
> reason to be paranoid and not trust that of course all the people 
> who believed him guilty are just waiting to listen to his story and 
> help him.  More reason than the leader of a resistance group with a 
> mole in it has for not being interested in the alleged culprit. 
><snip>

Carol responds:
I'm probably responding to the wrong post here. I really need one
that's complaining about Dumbledore's testimony, as if that's what
condemned Black. But let's look at that testimony, shall we? All
Dumbledore says is that Sirius Black was the Potters' Secret Keeper,
which is true as far as he knows. From that it can be inferred that he
betrayed the Potters and is indirectly responsible for their deaths.
But is that why Black went to prison? It may be part of the reason,
but it isn't the primary one. He went to Azkaban for blowing up the
street and murdering thirteen people. Yes, we know in retrospect that
he didn't cast that spell and one of the thirteen people didn't die,
but it wasn't Dumbledore's behavior that condemned him. It was the
testimony of all those Muggles who "saw" him do it. (Does anyone else
think that Black must have cast *some* spell, maybe a hex or jinx, so
that people saw him pointing his wand and light coming out of it? How
else could all those people have thought he blew up the street?)

At any rate, Dumbledore's testimony was only one small bit of
evidence, and Black would have gone to prison even without it because
of the eyewitness testimony of all those Muggles who "saw" him kill
thirteen people. The Potters and his being SK (or not) had nothing to
do with it.

As for DD investigating it afterwards, why? He knew there was a spy
close to the Potters, and it could only have been one of three people.
He knew that the Secret Keeper (who must have been the same person
unless there were two traitors) had betrayed the Potters to their
deaths. He knew that James either had made or intended to make Black
the Secret Keeper. Why should he suspect that the SK might be the
seemingly dead Pettigrew or the nowhere-to-be-found Lupin? Why
investigate an open-and-shut case--unless the person arrested protests
his innocence and gives a credible reason to do so?

Black should have gone to Dumbledore to explain the Secret Keeper
situation immediately after Godric's Hollow instead of going after
Pettigrew. DD had not at that time testified against him and he had at
that time no reason to distrust Dumbledore. Sursly, he wasn't
deterred, like Lupin, by the fear of revealing that three of the
Marauders were illegal Animagi. It must have been his own sense of
guilt over the Secret Keeper idea, and perhaps a lack of common sense,
that deterred him.

Carol, thinking that the importance of DD's testimony is being greatly
overrated considering the actual reason Black was arrested (Feel any
better, Alla?)