Pavel Young's and Lord Burdette's options

tlb wrote:

Garth 2 wrote:Pavel in a civilian court got confirmed* to ordering out an attempted assassination (as Denver failed) of a serving RMN officer during a time of war (the declaration was passed whilst Honor was in transit back from Grayson) which would probably be classified as "treason"

A good lawyer could point out that these supposed events of ordering a killing of Paul Tankersley and of Honor happened at the same time, which was alleged to be during a time of emergency and not a time of war. It is not clear to me that the criminal result of this arrangement is as bad as the political results would be. Pavel Young would be confirmed to have hired a professional duelist, an action that would result in exile from proper society.

However if it did result in an investigation that exposed the North Hollow files and removed them from his control, then his power would be gone. This is moot because he would still face a duel with Honor, once the slander trial was over.

Yep, missed that.
The attempts occurred at different points in time but the set-up for them occurred at the same time.

My reading was that if it went through the courts, it couldn't also be the reason for a challenge

tlb wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:Though if he's already exiled from society, by exposure that he hired a professional duelist, what possible motivation would Young have for accepting Honor's challenge?

He can't exactly get exiled and lose his political career again for refusing.

I'm betting in that situation he'd go for live coward and simply refuse the duel.

That sounds right. Would he give up the title to his brother in exchange for an allowance to live somewhere else or would he selfishly keep it? Is it possible that Honor would arrange for an assassination through the Audubon Ballroom or some other group?

If he could put himself into a situation where he could refuse the challenge by suing, then why not simply refuse without ever suing, If anything he would be less worse off, because he has not lost the slander suit,

The answer must be that he has wrapped up his self worth inextricably with being a Lord in Manticoran society and so finds it unacceptable to either risk losing the slander suit or refusing a challenge to a duel.

If the SKM system is the same as the European code of duel.
Once a challenge has been formally issued it can't be declined without effectively admitting the charges are true, if you face their fire and survive the whole thing is kind of "buried" and can't be brought back up by the parties involved.
Which in this instance would be an effective confirmation that he did pay Denver to kill Honor meaning were back to a formal investigation of Pavel actions, hence the sequence in the book.

Garth 2 wrote:If the SKM system is the same as the European code of duel.
Once a challenge has been formally issued it can't be declined without effectively admitting the charges are true, if you face their fire and survive the whole thing is kind of "buried" and can't be brought back up by the parties involved.
Which in this instance would be an effective confirmation that he did pay Denver to kill Honor meaning were back to a formal investigation of Pavel actions, hence the sequence in the book.

I grant you most of that, but I am interested in whether he could stay alive and stay out of jail. It seems to me that losing the slander case and refusing the challenge to a duel are equivalent in the eyes of society (which is why Jonathan_S stated that no additional harm would be done by refusing to duel after losing the case). But neither represents the basis for a criminal investigation (*), since we expect that the recorded confession which motivates Honor is not admissible in a criminal proceeding.

He would lose all standing in society, but the North Hollow files means that he does not necessarily lose all power; it is just that the remaining power would have to be exercised from the shadows. No proper member of society could be seen to have dealings with him, but information can still be passed by a lawyer or trusted servant.

(*) There might be an investigation over any payments made to Denver Summervale; but if sufficient care was taken, then nothing would come of it.

tlb wrote:I grant you most of that, but I am interested in whether he could stay alive and stay out of jail. It seems to me that losing the slander case and refusing the challenge to a duel are equivalent in the eyes of society (which is why Jonathan_S stated that no additional harm would be done by refusing to duel after losing the case). But neither represents the basis for a criminal investigation (*), since we expect that the recorded confession which motivates Honor is not admissible in a criminal proceeding.

(*) There might be an investigation over any payments made to Denver Summervale; but if sufficient care was taken, then nothing would come of it.

I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding is that once the evidence is logged into the legal system for any reason, how it was generated becomes less of an issue.
In this hypothetical reality, the recording has been confirmed as a true statement via the civil case (the equivalent would be an anonymous call to the police, saying I say x do y and which then triggers a criminal investigation), and therefore further criminal investigation should occur and your right the first line of enquiry would be "follow the money"

As for the duel, once the civil case has been processed "honour" has been satisfied and Honor wouldn't be able to challenge him.

As for his position in society, I agree he would become an outcast from it, and would either have to pass his seat to his younger brother or via proxy (if he wasn't stripped of title).

Further investigation, yes its a bit of a thorny subject on how to proceed but
1) I believe that there would be enough people who aren't in the files but are in positions of power, who may want to stick the knife in for their own reasons to push for it (the whole "no one is above the law argument") especially as it would weaken the conservative association
or
2) if it does come under the preview of the SKM internal security agency (think the group briefly introduced in the "Queen's Gambit"), then well it's "classified" becomes the answer

Garth 2 wrote:As for the duel, once the civil case has been processed "honour" has been satisfied and Honor wouldn't be able to challenge him.

I fail to understand why that would be the case. I do understand that the result of losing the case means that society no longer accepts that he is a gentleman for whom the concept of "honor" applies; but that does not mean that Honor would not still hunger to meet him on the dueling field. The problem for Honor is that the dueling field is called the field of "honor" and he would suffer no additional disgrace by refusing to meet her there.

So it is not that "honor" (nor Honor) has been satisfied, but that the basis for societal pressure has been removed.

tlb wrote:

Garth 2 wrote:As for the duel, once the civil case has been processed "honour" has been satisfied and Honor wouldn't be able to challenge him.

I fail to understand why that would be the case. I do understand that the result of losing the case means that society no longer accepts that he is a gentleman for whom the concept of "honor" applies; but that does not mean that Honor would not still hunger to meet him on the dueling field. The problem for Honor is that the dueling field is called the field of "honor" and he would suffer no additional disgrace by refusing to meet her there.

I read Garth's position as implying that there's some sort of double jeopardy that applies. Once the civil case makes a ruling on the particular issue, you can't retry it, even by way of duels.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:I read Garth's position as implying that there's some sort of double jeopardy that applies. Once the civil case makes a ruling on the particular issue, you can't retry it, even by way of duels.

That is the way, I read his statement also. Again I fail to see why that would be the case. I can understand why there would be no extra penalty to refusing a challenge to a duel if the case is lost. But however the case goes, I do not see that Honor would be satisfied by the result. Why would there be societal pressure on Honor to let go of her feelings toward what Pavel Young had done?

tlb wrote:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:I read Garth's position as implying that there's some sort of double jeopardy that applies. Once the civil case makes a ruling on the particular issue, you can't retry it, even by way of duels.

That is the way, I read his statement also. Again I fail to see why that would be the case. I can understand why there would be no extra penalty to refusing a challenge to a duel if the case is lost. But however the case goes, I do not see that Honor would be satisfied by the result. Why would there be societal pressure on Honor to let go of her feelings toward what Pavel Young had done?

How about reading "Honor wouldn't be able to challenge him" as "Honor wouldn't be able to issue a challenge that anyone would take seriously".

She could issue a new challenge every single day if that makes her feel better, but the ONLY thing that would come of it would be damage to her own reputation.

zyffyr wrote:How about reading "Honor wouldn't be able to challenge him" as "Honor wouldn't be able to issue a challenge that anyone would take seriously".

She could issue a new challenge every single day if that makes her feel better, but the ONLY thing that would come of it would be damage to her own reputation.

To be clear, I understand that if Young loses the slander case then Honor could not force a duel; because there is no further societal pressure to apply to him. However, what if he wins? Are we really saying that now Honor is the pariah and cannot ever again issue a challenge?

I am objecting to the idea that a civil case confers immunity like double jeopardy. Does a civil slander case have the result that whoever loses, will also lose whatever standing that they had in society?

tlb wrote:

zyffyr wrote:How about reading "Honor wouldn't be able to challenge him" as "Honor wouldn't be able to issue a challenge that anyone would take seriously".

She could issue a new challenge every single day if that makes her feel better, but the ONLY thing that would come of it would be damage to her own reputation.

To be clear, I understand that if Young loses the slander case then Honor could not force a duel; because there is no further societal pressure to apply to him. However, what if he wins? Are we really saying that now Honor is the pariah and cannot ever again issue a challenge?

I am objecting to the idea that a civil case confers immunity like double jeopardy. Does a civil slander case have the result that whoever loses, will also lose whatever standing that they had in society?

I wouldn't think losing a slander case would necessarily wreck all your standing. It'd depend on what the slander was.

In this instance Young would be wrecked by bringing the slander case because otherwise inadmissible evidence would show that he'd acted entirely beyond the pale; and now been caught at it.

But if Young somehow utterly beat all odds and won the slander case I don't think Honor getting hit with some civil penalty for slander would lose all her standing in society. Some standing, temporarily, probably - but it wouldn't be career ending or turn her into a pariah. (Well, her existing enemies would probably harp on it and try to maximize the damage, but still wouldn't ruin her) After all, all that would prove is that in the eyes of the law she knowingly propagated an untruth about someone she despised.

However I do think it would ruin her ability to challenge Young to a dual on those grounds. If she challenged him based on hiring Denver to kill Paul I don't think Young would lose any societaly standing for refusing to give satisfaction over a court had ruled wasn't true. I think he could easily refuse by saying she was incorrect and he had no need to defend such a specious claimed offense. I have to believe that society doesn't shun people who blow off truly frivolous or baseless challenges to a duel.

That doesn't block Honor from dueling him at all, but she'd have to do so over some other insult or offense - something that society would shun Young for failing to face. (And I suspect their previous bad encounters wouldn't meet that standard now - too much time has passed and claiming challenge over the Saganami Island incident, being stabbed in the back of Basilisk, or even his cowardly behavior that got him Court Marshaled, would (correctly) seem like Honor grasping on a pretext to challenge his when her actual complain was the one dismissed in court. So she'd probably need for him to commit some new and fairly egregious offense against her - so all he has to do to avoid her challenge is ignore her)