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Chapter 190 - Ch.190

After Doge there were several more people whom Harry did not recognise, including a man named Sturgis Podmore whom Harry thought looked rather like a scarecrow. Podmore had once seriously breached the International Statute of Secrecy when he got involved in a fight in a Muggle bar and end up hexing five people to have bats wings where their ears should be.

Dumbledore used his position as Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards to cover things up.

After Podmore's story was subjected to a vote, attentions were turned to the case of venerated retired Auror, Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody, and it was a shocker.

It was well known that Moody was paranoid, so his enchanting the dustbins in his garden to act as guard dogs was not that much of a surprise.

However, the revelation that these bins had once killed one muggle eleven year old boy and seriously maimed his friend when they snuck into Moody's garden in order to retrieve an errant football immediately caused a stir amongst those witnessing the trial.

The subsequent revelation that Dumbledore had covered the incident up in order to protect Moody's reputation nearly caused a riot. Things only calmed down when Madam Bones asked her Aurors to draw their wands. No spells were fired though, as the threat alone was enough.

Things did not remain quiet for long though. When Madam Bones revealed that Moody had not only been involved in the incident had Hogwarts, but had also assisted Dumbledore in capturing Harry and modifying his memories, the crowd was about ready to see Moody put to death on the spot.

In the end Head Auror Scrimgeour called on four more Aurors to stand guard around Moody. Only once the number of guards around the former Auror matched the number of those surrounding Snape did the crowd quiet down, allowing the proceedings to continue.

After Moody was a tall, black Auror named Kingsley Shacklebolt, and once he had heard the case against the man, Harry could not help but feel a little bit sorry for him.

Shacklebolt had been the Senior Auror in charge of recapturing Sirius. Shacklebolt had joined The Order on the recommendation of Mad-Eye Moody and had learned the truth about Sirius. However, instead of using his time and resources to create a case for Sirius' freedom, Shacklebolt had instead directed the search overseas, following up on his personally created false leads that Sirius was in Tibet.

His intentions were honourable in a way, but at the same time wildly misguided. While he had not sold Sirius out, he had also cost the Ministry a lot of money, man hours and other resources, not only in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, but in the Department of International Magical Cooperation as well.

To make things worse, Shacklebolt's information has also lead to the International Confederation of Wizards getting involved, along with the Tibetan Ministry for Magic.

On the other hand, once he had started to feed the Ministry false information, he was in a no win situation, just like Bill. If Shacklebolt decided to go against Dumbledore, Dumbledore would have ruined him.

In the end, the Wizengamot was only going to vote one way, and that was before Madam Bones even got to the fact that Shacklebolt had also played a role in the potioning of students.

Five more people went by before Madam Bones got to a name that Harry recognised.

Nymphadora Tonks.

Like Kingsley, she had joined The Order of the Phoenix after being persuaded to do so by Mad-Eye Moody. Like Kingsley, she had failed to bring information on Sirius to the Ministry. When she had been caught spying on the trial of Harry Potter for Dumbledore and subsequently been dismissed, Dumbledore had employed her at Hogwarts, leaving her in much the same situation as Bill – employment in a great job, arranged by a man who could very easily take it away again if she did not do his bidding.

Like Bill, the vote was a very close thing, but the decision to convict won out.

After Tonks was a woman named Hestia Jones.

Madam Bones wasted no time in revealing that Hestia and her sister, Holyhead Harpies' starting seeker Gwenog Jones had been doing some illegal money raising. Harry had never gambled money in his life but the concept, as far as he could tell, was that Hestia would sort out the bets, and if the returns offered were high enough, Gwenog would deliberately lose a Quidditch match.

Then Dumbledore found out. From there, the rest was easily guessed.

After two more faces Harry didn't know, Dedalus Diggle was put on trial. Harry remembered meeting the man in The Leaky Cauldron when Hagrid had taken him for his first trip to Diagon Alley, back before he had started his first year at Hogwarts.

The purple hat was gone now though, along with the cheery smile.

Diggle, as it turned out, had a habit of setting off magical fireworks in order to celebrate… well, almost anything he felt like, it seemed. Magical fireworks have a tendency to be very different to Muggle fireworks, so much so that using one in a Muggle area is usually considered to be a breach of the International Statute of Secrecy.

Needless to say, Dumbledore repeatedly covered up these breaches and therefore secured Diggle's loyalty.

Then there was Mundungus Fletcher, whom Harry recognised as being the Wizard who had turned up at Privet Drive in the aftermath of the Dementor attack that almost resulted in his being expelled from Hogwarts.

Fletcher, as it turned out, was the very definition of a Wizarding lowlife – a sneak-thief who would probably sell his own grandmother for the right price. In addition to multiple counts of theft, Dumbledore had gone out of his way to cover up six separate instances of Muggle baiting on Fletcher's part.

Of these, the most serious was selling toilet seats that were charmed to come alive when sat on and bite down hard on the buttocks of the unfortunate person who had done the sitting. Then there was one instance of Fletcher selling gold watches that were designed to disappear into thin air and return to the seller within twelve hours, three instances of using leprechaun gold to barter with Muggle market-stall owners and one instance of selling a Muggle an enchanted tea pot that would shoot boiling tea out of its spout and into the face of whomever was nearest.

Though, Fletcher claimed, he did not actually know that the tea pot was enchanted until after he had sold it.

Fletcher's principle role in The Order was to keep an ear out in the criminal world and report anything of interest back to Dumbledore. He was also frequently tasked with procuring a few of the more unsavoury artefacts that The Order occasionally required.

After Fletcher there were several more people whom Harry did not know until, at last, the trials moved on to the staff of Hogwarts.

Filius Flitwick had been caught by a reporter in a rather compromising position with two Hags and a Swamp Troll after night's heavy drinking in celebration of his winning his final duel before retiring from the professional duelling circuit. Such a scandal would have ruined Flitwick's reputation and Dumbledore found a way to silence the reporter before the story could be printed.

Needless to say, the respect that many graduates of Ravenclaw House had for their former Head of House took a massive downturn when that story was revealed.

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