Detecting magic (was: re AKs and Horcrux!Harry and soul-ripping )

[pippin_999]

> Eloise:
> I think Dumbledore suggests that his interest in Muggle news is 
> unusual. I doubt many ordinary wizards would have heard of it as
they  would have to go out of their way to read the Muggle press or
listen  to the Muggle wireless (I suppose they might have gone to the
cinema  and seen a news reel).

Pippin:
Um, the business of the MoM is to look into unusual events before
the Muggles start suspecting magic. 

 In the course of this, if they uncover what seems obviously to be a
wizard's murder, moreover one which they can easily solve so that it 
looks like they are doing their jobs, why would they even try to keep
it out of the Daily Prophet?

OTOH, Cedric's death, supposedly on the Hogwarts grounds, was 
not something that would attract any Muggle attention. Frank Bryce's 
disappearance did not attract much attention from anybody either.

Maybe there were traces of magic in the graveyard that Dumbledore
could detect. But unless they were independently detected by
the ministry, that wouldn't help  any more than Snape's showing
off his dark mark.


> Eloise:
> Oh, agreed, but that still leaves some ambiguity (IMO) of why the
MOM  detects magic in some circumstances and not others, assuming, 
as  seems to be implied in the text, that there is some way that the
MOM  has of remotely sensing when magic happens.
>   

Pippin:
I agree. But I think it's easily explained by the vagaries of
enforcement and the cunning of the Order and the DE's, who seem to be 
able to hide some kinds of magic but not others.

The Order isn't afraid to use various charms as they prepare Harry to
depart from the Dursleys, but they don't think they can hide a portkey
charm. And the whole point of using the TWT seems to have been to
get Harry to touch a portkey whose creation had been authorized.

Dumbledore might be able to hide the creation of a portkey while he's
at Hogwarts, but not elsewhere. A good question might be whether
a portkey has to be created close to one of its termini, so that
it wouldn't be possible for Dumbledore, while at Hogwarts, to 
create a portkey to transport people from Privet Drive to GP.


> Eloise:
> I accept your reasons for why there might not have been an enquiry. 
> But *magic always leaves traces*. And his death, which therefore
bore traces of magic also thus bore the marks, or rather the lack of 
marks, of an AK.
> 

Pippin:
But if there's no enquiry, they're not going to be discovered, are
they?

Eloise:
> What I'm saying is that if the prosecution themselves couldn't
bring forward the witness who had informed the MOM that they had, 
err,   witnessed magic being performed in front of a Muggle, then 
they  hadn't a leg to stand on. 

Pippin:
They had the Muggle himself, so why would they need to produce
the witness who told them the Muggle was there? The MoM's
methods of evidence collection aren't on trial.

Dumbledore might raise the issue, and they'd blow him off, just
like they did about what the dementors were doing there in the
first place.

Anyway, I'm sure Umbridge could have found a way around that one. 
There must be  lots of people who owe her favors and could have 
been "just passing through when they saw what happened."

That wouldn't have to undermine their case against Harry, either.
 As the patronus is not a charm any wizard can produce, it
would be possible for Umbridge to introduce a "witness" who claimed
to have informed the Ministry about the Muggle, but couldn't have 
produced a patronus himself.

Pippin