Veritaserum wont work. The answer one gives to a question when under veritaserum is what one believes to be true. There is no guarantee its the truth.

Or say that he had a dream about dementors. Harry did have a traumatic experience with them. He got scared and the moment he woke up, instinctively cast the patronus. That has to count for something.

 

In Canada, polygraphs test aren't accepted in Court because they aren't reliable. You can't use them to prove or give credence to your position.

If you want to make a deal, they will ask you to take a polygraph test to see if you are honest, but they will not be able to use it in Court.

Maybe veritaserum is in the same situation: it isn't accepted as proof in Court, but may be helpful for the investigation.

By the way, does veritaserum force you to answer or force you only to say the truth ?

 

Is it at all possible that the Fidelus (sp?) Charm might overpower the Imperius or Veritaserum? I know that in fanon everyone and their mother's giraffe throws around the suggestion of using it, but in canon didn't it come about as an extremely obscure charm that either Lily or Dumbledore came across?

In regards to getting Sirius out...Magical Courts still have due process, even if they don't always adhere to it, right? With a little gold to grease the wheels and some public outrage about the 'unidentified innocent withering away in Azkaban without a trial', wouldn't it be possible to get Sirius a trial?

@metal.v : The Minitry is focusing on portraying Harry as a dangerous, disturbed individual. Saying he instinctively cast powerful magic that only competent adult mages can usually cast in his sleep due to a nightmare probably wouldn't be the best way to go about seeing as how it'd give the Ministry actual concrete evidence that wasn't hearsay to support them.

 

Wouldn't Sirius NOT having a dark mark raise some major questions? Especially as he's seen as Voldemort's right hand man. In a trial that would have helped his case.

 

It probably would, but the whole right hand man thing likely arose as a rumor to explain his "betrayal".

 

I'm pretty sure that the Dark Mark isn't common knowledge. At the very least, Sirius didn't seem to know it existed in GoF and if anyone would have known about it in the first war it would have been the Order of the Phoenix.

 

I'm pretty sure it was common knowledge, given the spell Morsmordre. If nobody drew the connection between that and the tattoo that Voldemort's Death Eaters all had on their left arm during the first war, then I'd be beyond flabbergasted.

 

I didn't mean the Dark Mark itself, just the tattoo form.

 

Just curious, where exactly in canon do we see that Veratiserum is unreliable?

 

Dumbledore mentions an antidote in the sixth book and JKR said in an interview something to the effect of occlumency blocking it as well.

 

Just because you can't use magic to prove something, it doesn't mean that you can't show it to be true to a reasonable degree of accuracy.

If magical methods were required to establish the truth of something then IRL courts would be fucked.

 

I'd have gone crazy with Unbreakable Vows if I had been Crouch Sr., during the first war with Voldemort. Just horrible, horrible promises:

- Tell the truth during your trial.
- If you're guilty, you get Azkaban - plus another Unbreakable Vow to never serve Voldemort again. Said Vow would then be memory charmed out of you.
- If you're innocent, no Azkaban, but same Vow.

 

When he mentioned the antidote, I got the impression that he meant something to cut off the need to tell the truth prior to the effects running its course rather than a way to stop it taking effect after being administered.

Edit: Nevermind, just thought that idea through properly.

 

What the fuck are you even talking about? Your first paragraph is unsupported fanon unless you have some canon info I don't remember, and the second is a horrible non-sequitor; the question was about Harry proving Voldemort is back, not him stupidly lying to get away with underage magic.

And back to Veritaserum: There's no good reason it has to only make the drinker tell the truth "as he/she knows it" because IT'S MAGIC. I'm not advocating the retarded shit like Veritas Oracle, where Harry's dosed with Veritaserum and proceeds to regurgitate shit he had no possible way of knowing; taking things to their logical conclusion gave way to the extreme conclusion there.

What I am saying though, is that Veritaserum should be able to overcome delusions and the like. After all, it's known as the most powerful TRUTH serum, not the most powerful GIVE ME YOUR OPINION serum.

Magic is about intent, and the intent is the truth the drinker knows, not the badly-reasoned bullshit they're telling themselves.

 

What about memory charms? Think Veritaserum has enough power to get through/bypass them?

Also, what about tricksy ways around answering? A charm in the ear of the person under the influence asking them a quick yes/no question that no one else could hear; would that allow manipulation of the answers?

 

Up to the author of the fanfic, but AFAIK - in canon - the memory charm removes the memory; therefore no, the Veritaserum would not 'bypass" the memory charm. Of course, Voldemort broke through a memory charm on Bertha Jorkins, so perhaps the memory isn't removed. And yet, as a result of Voldemort's actions, Bertha's mind was broken as well, so make of that what you will. It could be argued that Voldemort possessed Bertha a la Quirrel and Harry, and somehow pulled the erased memory from her soul, blah blah blah. Again, it isn't spelled out, so an author would have loads of leeway.

Now you're just being ridiculous. Of course it's possible, but it would take a monumentally skilled author to make than anything less than an utter failure.

 

It's stated in the book, that Bertha's memory became crazy after Crouch memory charmed her, so maybe a well done memory charm removes the memory, but a badly done, like Crouches under the pressure that she found out his supposedly dead son only suppresses the memory, so it can be broken, but it has extreme strains on ones brains...