The matter of Miss Calderwood

[alt_mcgonagall]

Miss Calderwood is not to be expelled for her part in the pink parchment affair.

The Cruciatus curse shall be publicly performed on her by Professor Alecto Carrow on Thursday at breakfast. She will then be prohibited from attending the Yule Ball, and will be sent down from Hogwarts for the remainder of the year. She will be allowed to repeat this year's coursework when school resumes after the summer holidays. (This latter part of the punishment will be confirmed by the board of governors on Thursday, presuming that she shows appropriate contrition.)

As a word of warning to students who may think of following Miss Calderwood's example. Expulsion was seriously discussed, as was the possibility of allowing all students below their fourth year to attempt the Cruciatus curse on Miss Calderwood, in their classes. Should there appear to be a spate of copy-cats, their punishments will be harsher.

Comments

I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_ron]

Uh

That's really awful. I don't care what Calderwood did, I don't want to see her get crucio. And I really don't want to see her do it.

Guess the elves won't have to cook much on Thursday.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

If a half-blood had done what Cassandra did, they'd probably have cruciated her publicly and then snapped her wand and sent her to the camps.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_ron]

Honestly, I could see snapping her wand if she did what people are saying. Attack Professor Sinistra, I mean.

But then the place to send her would be St Mungo's or some private hospital where they'd help put her right, yeah?

And I don't really understand letting her come back here.

I reckon it's because her family pulled strings that she'll be allowed back next year. So, yeah, it'd be totally different if she were a halfblood. Or even someone like me.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

Yeah.

I was thinking that if a pureblood got expelled they wouldn't be sent to the camps. But you know, if Neville attacked Professor Sinistra? I expect they'd make an exception.

I don't know what they'd do if it were you.

Of course all of us have more sense than to attack a teacher. Especially Professor Sinistra, why would anyone want to hurt her? She's one of the nicest people at the school.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_neville]

I bet they would, too. (Not that I have it in for Professor Sinistra, or anything.)

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

I keep coming back to that. If Cassie was going to try to hurt a teacher WHY would she go after Professor Sinistra? At LEAST go after Acton!

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

Anyway what I heard is that Cassandra was slipping cursed parchments (pink ones) into piles on Professor Sinistra's desk, that would have really hurt her if she'd picked them up.

I'd noticed Professor Sinistra has tidied her office a LOT and when I was working in there she had areas she didn't want me even touching. I thought it was because there was something she didn't want me to disturb but actually I think she was worried I'd set off the curse.

Probably part of why she didn't get punished more harshly is that Professor Sinistra never actually got hurt. Also, Professor Sinistra probably didn't want anything really awful to happen to her. I wonder if it had been -- oh, Aurelia Archer or someone who could potentially get in MUCH WORSE trouble if she'd have handled it herself to protect her?

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

I wonder why they are waiting until THURSDAY.

At least when I had it done to me I didn't have time to get worried about it. Being told 'you'll get cruciated in four days' time' and then locked up somewhere that you don't have anything to do but think about it seems like it would make it a lot worse.

Do you know where they've got her? She definitely was not allowed to come back to Slytherin.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_neville]

Yeah, it is really awful.

And it would have been even more awful if they had tried to get students to do the curse. Ugh.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

Well for the people who aren't in Dark Arts they couldn't possibly have expected you to succeed at it. You could point your wand at people all day and say 'crucio!' and nothing's going to happen unless you WANT it to.

Private message to Headmistresss McGonagall

[alt_sinistra]

Minerva -

I'm very sorry, again, for the necessity of dropping this in your lap. I hope the conversations with the Board were not too difficult.

(And I admit, I'm curious how they came to that decision, if you can share that.)

Re: Private message to Headmistress McGonagall

[alt_mcgonagall]

It was perfectly all right. You had no other choice.

As for the decision, there were a number of factors. Her offense was extremely serious, yet I do not wish to normalise expulsions - for Miss Calderwood the effects of such a thing would have been far-reaching, but for another student they might be disastrous. And, of course, many of our board members do not think of the Cruciatus curse as quite such a severe punishment as I do. So a deal had to be brokered.

Re: Private message to Headmistress McGonagall

[alt_sinistra]

I understand.

I can't say I'm happy about any of it. As I suspect you know.

Re: Private message to Headmistress McGonagall

[alt_mcgonagall]

As I suspect you know, neither am I.

Re: Private message to Headmistress McGonagall

[alt_sinistra]

Which is something, yes.

Thank you for that.

I can think of so many ways this could have been worse.