Was Ministry going to punish Snape if kills Sirius on site? WAS: On perfecti

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 169097

Alla wrote:
> <snip>
> To make a long story short, I guess I am arguing against Snape 
> demonstrating some sort of not self serving restraint in the Shack.
> 
> I believe that the only reason that he did not kill Sirius and Lupin 
> is because he did not want to take a chance and be tried for using 
> whatever curses he would have use to kill them - maybe unforgivables 
> or maybe not.  <snip>

Carol responds:
Thanks for the canon, all of which shows that Snape did the right
thing: taking the man he thought was a murderer to Fudge rather than
killing him himself--in marked contrast to Lupin and Black, who wanted
to take justice into their own hands regarding Peter Pettigrew, the
real murderer, by murdering him in front of three kids.

Snape thought that Sirius Black had murdered the same twelve Muggles
that Wormtail actually killed, as well as Pettigrew himself, based on
the testimony of many Muggle witnesses and a sentence to Azkaban, and
that Black was trying to murder Harry, as evidenced by the Fat Lady's
painting and Ron's bedcurtains, both slashed with a twelve-inch knife
by Sirius Black. He also thought, based in part on Black's own words a
moment before, that Black tried to murder *him* when they were both
sixteen.

Quite possibly he was tempted by vengeance, but quite wisely and
sensibly, he refrained from killing Black, instead attempting to bring
him in, being knocked unconscious by three kids (whom he later claimed
had been confunded and did not ask to have expelled), and then waking
up to find that the werewolf was loose on the grounds and everyone
else in the party (except Wormtail, whom he didn't see and didn't
believe had been present) was unconscious.

What does Snape do? Does he take advantage of the situation to
silently murder Black or turn him over to the Dementors himself? Nope.
He conjures stretchers for Black and the three kids and takes the kids
to the hospital wing and Black to Fudge.

Whatever he may have wanted to do, he did the right thing. It's no
fault of his that the MoM convicted the wrong man, nor that the real
killer escaped into the night in the form of a rat. (Nor is it
Harry's. He, too, did the right thing. Only Lupin and Black, who would
have killed a man if it weren't for Harry's intervention, and Lupin
again in endangering three children by going out onto the grounds
without his potion, knowing that at least one of them was in the
Shrieking Shack, did anything wrong IMO.

So thanks, Alla. You're right that Snape may have avoided a prison
sentence for taking justice into his own hands a la Lupin and Black,
but he also refrained from committing murder in front of three kids.
Had it turned out that Black really was planning to kill Harry, I
think even the most ardent anti-Snapers would have to reluctantly call
Snape a hero. And even as it is, the kids owe him their lives for
taking them to the hospital wing when a werewolf was on the grounds.
They just can't see Snape's side of things because they think he's
motivated solely by a schoolboy grudge.

Carol, who hopes to see the schoolboy grudge revealed as a red herring
in DH