Stan Shunpike - As White as he's Painted? (Was: CHAPDISC: HBP30, The White Tomb)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 165851

> 
> Any thoughts on what Stan was being held for out there, other than 
> what is in the quoted material above?
> 

Pippin:
You didn't report the part of the conversation with Arthur where he says
that no one who knows anything seriously suspects that Stan is guilty.

"I mean, anybody who's actually interviewed him agrees that he's about
as much a Death Eater as this satsuma...but the top levels want to look
as though they're making some progress, and 'three arrests' sounds 
better than 'three mistaken arrests and releases'...but again, this is all
top secret..."

That is the secret  Scrimgeour doesn't want to discuss with Harry --
Stan's innocent, and is being held because it would make the ministry
look bad to say it was making no progress. Scrummy has a point,
though a weak one. There are Wormtails in other circles besides the
Potters'. Many are less willing than Harry or Dumbledore to fight a losing
battle, and might desert if they knew how poorly the fight was going on.

I did have some hopes that Stan would be released now that at least one
genuine Death Eater has been captured, but that was naive. Letting him
go would be tantamount to admitting there was no reason to hold him in
the first place. I don't think he has really done anything worse than waste
the ministry's time with his silly boasting. It was idiocy on a level with
cracking jokes about hijackers while in line at the airport, but he's no
terrorist.

Pippin