Dealing with Dursleys
For the Dursleys the day started off right. Vernon and Petunia were happy their son was allowed to visit them during the weekend, taking a break from school (actually suspended due to a bullying incident which the Dursleys vehemently denied), and Vernon’s sister Marge came to visit (Petunia didn’t like to have the dog around but could tolerate Marge). They liked having the freak out of their hair for ten out of twelve months in the year. Only problem was they had to do chores and errands themselves but you win some, you lose some.
They were getting together, nicely talking about their own boring ordinary and non-freakish lives and enjoying breakfast as the doorbell rang. Vernon decided to get it, thinking it must be the mailman. He nearly had a heart attack (which he has about once every two to three weeks due to unhealthy lifestyle choices) upon seeing the cops. “What can I do for you officers?” he asked politely. He kept his cool, barely. Maybe they just are solving a case nearby and ask if they had seen anything.
“I am officer Radcliffe of the Surrey Police. This is my partner, Officer Watson. Vernon Dursley?” one of the cops, a burly man said.
“Yes?”
“Vernon Dursley, you are under arrest for child abuse, tax fraud and embezzlement!” Officer Radcliffe said.
Vernon Dursley turned green. “This must be a mistake. I don’t abuse my son, and those possible errors in administration, I’m pretty sure there is a logical explanation…”
“We weren’t talking about the abuse of your son, though he will get a rap sheet of own. No, it is abuse against your nephew, Harry James Potter!” the second cop said, an Amazonian woman apparently called Watson, said.
“The freak? He is lying! He is a troublemaker, a delinquent. He is a disturbed child and…” Vernon started to rant, turning purple and spittle coming from his mouth, though he soon realized using the word ‘freak’ is not a good word to use in presence of officers and interrupted his rants.
“We will be the judge of that, are you coming willingly, or do we have to make this hard?” Radcliffe asked.
“Vernon, what is going on?” Petunia asked as she headed for the front door. Only to go pale herself when there were cops standing.
“Mrs. Petunia Dursley, I presume? We will have to arrest you too, for child abuse and being complicit in the crimes of your husband.” Officer Watson said.
“You can’t arrest us! We honest citizens. We are normal people. You can’t take us! Just you wait, I have friends in high places, I will have your jobs for this…” Vernon said as he was in the officers’ faces and raised his fists. And then, suddenly he found himself tased. It was comical to see him twitching, and a bit disgusting as his rolls of fat jiggled like jelly as he dropped like a house of cards.
Petunia gulped. “Are you going to give us any problems, ma’am?” Officer Radcliffe asked and Petunia shook her head.
“Mom, dad, what is going on?” Dudley asked.
“Petunia, whom is bothering you at the door? Tell them to leave? Your bacon is nearly burning!” Marge said.
“Oh, those must be the son and the sister of Mr. Dursley.” Officer Watson said. “They were supposed to be next on our list.”
“Good thing, does mean we don’t have to make any detours or rely on our colleagues of other districts to help us here.” Officer Radcliffe said.
“Wait, whatever you do, don’t involve my little Duddy-kins, he is an angel.” Petunia begged.
“Sorry ma’am, if he didn’t have his fair share of crimes on his record, we wouldn’t have to. But he is guilty of assault, bullying, vandalism and petty theft among things.” Officer Radcliffe said.
“And Mrs. Marjory ‘Marge’ Dursley, is guilty for both child and animal abuse.” Officer Watson added.
“B-b-b-but…” Petunia stammered.
“You have the right to remain silent, ma’am!” Officer Watson said as she pulled out the handcuffs. She looked behind them and there were multiple police cars. They weren’t alone, so they were in so much trouble.
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“So, when I realized I never had to go back and never needed to call it home…” Harry asked.
“…the wards collapsed. Now something that is normally handy for the wards, but has proven to be to your disadvantage it came with a minor perception filter or Confounding effect, which would prevent people from recognizing you. But it has the nasty side effect that some people fail to report the Dursley’s for their indiscretions. I had a few people watch the property despite that, and they reported everything to me…and I made a list of their transgressions so when the day came they were no longer needed, I could bring down everything upon them.” Dumbledore explained.
“You had me watched?” Harry asked.
“Did I forget to mention that last time? Yeah, Arabella Fig, your neighbor is actually a Squib. She had lost her husband and children to the war, and she always felt sad due to her condition she was unable to contribute. It was the best she could do. Know that she didn’t like any more then me you had to be with the Dursleys and she had to act…eccentric because if they thought you liked it there, the Dursleys wouldn’t have let you visit her.” Dumbledore said, as he sighed again, in sadness at the decisions he took. “I think she would like to talk to you after this whole thing is over to apologize.”
“I wouldn’t mind. She may have always been kooky, she was also a sweet old lady.” Harry said. “So, now that the wards are down…”
“Some fog in some people’s brains will be lifted. I also sent my notes to a few of my contacts working closely in the Muggle world, so that when they lay down the law for the Dursleys, they are able to provide any paperwork needed for the case without breaking the Statue of Secrecy.” Dumbledore said. “I’m so glad I can abandon this half-baked plan of mine now.”
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“I swear, it’s all a lie. He is a criminal, a delinquent. We had to send him to St. Brutus, an institute where a punk like him belongs!” Vernon said as he was being interrogated by Officer Radcliffe.
“Silence!” the cop said. “We have been in contact with St. Brutus. No student named Harry Potter was ever there. We have been given documentation form a boarding school in Scotland proving his attendance there, and he was enrolled by his parents since birth. But on other documents, official documents you put St. Brutus, which means that you falsified some information.”
“That institute is for freaks, founded by freaks, and ran by freaks! Don’t trust any paperwork they provide you. They muddle your minds.” Vernon ranted.
“And care to explain why these people would be ‘freaks’?” Officer Radcliffe asked.
Vernon had to pick his next few words carefully. Because if they told them they were magical, they think they would be insane. “They just dropped the kid of on our doorstep like a milk bottle. With a letter his parents were dead and he was our responsibility now.”
“A party involved had mentioned that his parents were the target of a group of radicals and were sent to you for their protection, and in return your own protection would be provided if you took care of him.” Officer Watson said to Petunia, for whom the first part of the interrogation had been close to Vernon’s.
“My sister and her husband got themselves blown up due to associating with the wrong people. They made their bed and had to lie in it. The kid was forced upon us and we were threatened with our safety.” Petunia said.
“But you still took him in and used the paperwork, which means you were responsible. And you were warned about the potential harm to the child, and were offered a protection. You still had a responsibility.” Officer Watson pointed out.
“I didn’t want to get roped up in this. I felt I had to because they wouldn’t leave me alone otherwise. I felt they would threaten me if I didn’t take care of the freakish little brat.” Petunia spat.
“Though the child was innocent in it. Whether you like it or not, the paperwork was filed, you were responsible for the kid and you and your husband failed in that duty!” Officer Watson said.
Back to Vernon and Watson. “He was a burden, he was a leech. And he was so ungrateful, he should be thankful we went out of our way to feed and clothe him and give him a roof over his head, while he was a drain on our finances.”
“That is also interesting…a stipend was provided to you to take care of young Harry Potter, from a fund set up by his late parents.” Officer Radcliffe said. “You were given money to take care of him. He would not have been a drain. You pocketed the money and used it on yourselves while barely feeding the kid, giving him no gifts aside hand-me-downs. Under the right circumstances that could be considered a form of fraud.”
“Fraud? What fund? Isn’t that a stipend from the government for housing a second child?” Vernon asked surprised.
“Don’t act stupid. The stipend isn’t even a fraction of the monthly fund for young Mr. Potter’s upbringing. You were not only abusing the kid, you were stealing from his family. You enjoyed the bits of the Potter Fortune you were provided and above everything else you did were trying to use him to rob him.” Officer Radcliffe said.
“Their parents were rich?” Vernon went green. The kid’s family was rich. He really didn’t know the money came from the Potters. He really thought it was a stipend because he didn’t believe the boy’s father was rich or influential. He didn’t want to know anything about him so anything associated with him had been tuned out. If he knew the boy was rich…
“Either you and your husband are the most ignorant people ever or you’re playing dumb to try and get out of the fact you stole money from your nephew and late sister. You can decide for yourself which sounds better.” Officer Watson said to Petunia. Yeah, the talks still paralleled each other.
Petunia didn’t know what to say. Because no answer was going to make her look good. She gulped. But Officer Watson wasn’t done.
“We got his medical files form his school, and with the damage I’m surprised they manage to fix him up. Forcing him to do all the chores, barely feeding him, denying him any possessions of his own, beating him down, and forcing him to jeopardize his studies to make your own son look good. Speaking off, you also had your son gleefully use the boy as his personal punching bag. And by raising your son to be a psycho like you and your man, and the fact he is morbidly obese, can be considered a second case of child abuse.”
“It’s true that several parties took way too long to report you, or provide the testimonies and evidence necessary, and some mistakes have been admitted on part of some administrations…we got everything to put you and your wife away for a long time, if it was only about the boy. But embezzling money from your company…” Officer Radcliffe continued with Vernon.
Vernon had done it for so long, sneaking small amounts each month which built up over time, all while sabotaging his colleagues and ruining them to get promotions. Since the wards technically protected him, so it wasn’t found out, now he was a sitting duck. He thought he was smart, but actually it was the magic he denied did anything for them. And he embezzled quite a bit, combined with the funds they received monthly for Harry, no wonder he was able to provide his son with so many birthday gifts…though that boy will get fewer, in fact he may no longer enjoy anything good.
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“How is Sirius’ case coming along?” Harry asked Dumbledore.
“They try to slow it down, but with the mass hysteria involving Crouch Jr., they can no longer hide it, too much people know about it. So they are going to be forced to have the trials. Black and both Crouches’ trials will come soon, though the reopened cases against the ‘respectable Purebloods’ still have some delay.” Dumbledore explained.
“Not too many people want this to go through. I’m worried about Sirius’ safety.” Harry admitted.
“I failed in my duty yet again when I trusted that Sirius had received the trial he deserved, and during a time when I was at the ICW to do damage control. That he never had one…I should have checked. But with Amelia Bones’ help we are keeping Sirius somewhere safe, and she has some of her most loyal and the incorruptible Aurors on her side, and I have a few contingencies just in case. The donation you made to the Department also helped them greatly.” Dumbledore explained. “Even if things go south, I prepared some escape routes, and even if Sirius can’t take guardianship, me and several others will, as long as you and your new family are behind the wards, you cannot be harmed.
“That’s a relief.” Harry said. “And I don’t have to get involved myself?”
“I made sure that the right people will handle the Dursleys, you never have to see them again. And they will not be able to harm anyone else either. It’s best that your time is not wasted with them, instead spent with true family. That time with them, is much more valuable.” And Dumbledore wished he had known that when he was young and foolish, and before he lost Arianna.
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“…making you complicit to the abuse!” Marge Dursley was interrogated by another officer, Officer Grint.
“I believed my brother when he said he was a delinquent and a troublemaker, what reason would I have to doubt him? I also barely interact with the little shit and I didn’t know anything about his true school or rich background.” Marge said.
“Even if so, you received a few handouts from your brother using the money of Harry’s family. You also added to the abuse. No matter what you thought, the way he was being treated would not be normal. And if you thought it was right, then you are as criminal as your brother.” Officer Grint growled.
“It doesn’t matter if he little bastard wasn’t going to a school for young criminals or is apparently rich, he was still an ungrateful brat that needed discipline!” Marge said.
“I see you have no remorse. After all, you have no qualms about hurting anyone, whether kids or dogs. Someone in your hometown admitted to having helped you abuse something else then kids. A retired Colonel, Mr. Ezekiel Fubster, to be precise. Several dogs, drowned for being ‘impure’. The ones left alive are highly aggressive and are unable to be allowed to live. If the dog you had with you is any indication, they are dangerous to kids, you had sicked them on him before. The dogs are most likely all have to be put to sleep.” Grint said. “Even if the charges about the money won’t stick, there are enough abuse cases against you, for children and animals alike.”
Marge Dursley couldn’t help but faint, knowing that she and her family were done for, that her precious pure bred dogs would be put down, and she would go to jail.
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“So you’ll never see the walrus, the whale calf, the ostrich and the walrus’ sister ever again?” Maps asked.
“How dare you say that, Maps?” Cloak remarked. “Walruses, ostriches and whales are majestic beings, they are far from majestic. At best a few blobfishes and flatworms.”
“I wish I had a chance to punch them at least once, though.” Bolt said.
“And I’d like to serve that dog of fat f*** senior’s sister with a big side of bacon for trying to take a bite out of Harry. Not so much fun if I took a bit out of it.” Hedwig growled.
“Is that hyperbole or not?” Harry asked.
“I’m still partially owl. And the dog would be prey-size. Probably won’t take as good as bacon.” Hedwig noted.
“You’ll one day turn into a slice of bacon, and you’d eat yourself.” Maps joked.
“Without a question.” Hedwig droned.
“In the end…while it would be tempting to rub it in their faces that I’m rich and powerful and they are not…I am not the gloating type and they are not only defanged, but also have their lives ruined. That’s enough for me. Also, it would mean that I give them more attention then I deserve. They aren’t worth the effort if we can delegate it to the proper authorities.”
“Really mature of you, little master Harry.” Cloak said.
“Bit boring though, I had a thousand tricks I could have played on them. I thought about putting Dung Bombs all over the house…can we smuggle some in the prison?” Maps asked.
“There is a Statue of Secrecy.” Bolt pointed out.
“We can blame it on sewage system failure.” Maps noted.
“They aren’t worth the effort. You can still target Malfoy or anyone sharing his views though.” Harry noted. “One thing I’d miss though is if I had confronted the Dursleys directly, I’d have taken you to see Muggle England. Cherish the small things. Visit some shops, eating a hamburger…”
“Does do those come with bacon?” Hedwig noted.
“Addict.” Maps noted.
“I can stop whenever I want, I just don’t want to.” Hedwig said.
“I can still make the trip with you during the holidays at least.” Harry noted. “Our first family outing. Sirius will be cleared by then and we can invite him to join.”
“Sounds great.” Bolt noted. The rest of them agreed.
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“Why am I here? Where are Mum and Dad? Aunt Marge?” Dudley asked. He was talking to Ms. Lynch, an officer specialized in juveniles, young criminals not yet of age.
“They are being interrogated, Dudley. You may not want to hear it, but they are criminals. They have hurt someone real badly…and you have too, right?”
“Yes, but it’s just the little freak. Who cares about him?” Dudley replied.
“Whatever you may have been told or what you think you know, it is not all right to hurt other people that way. Not your cousin, and not the other kids you and your friends bullied (whom we’ll pay a visit too by the way). And for what?” Ms. Lynch asked.
“Because I could?” Dudley replied dumbly, not realizing it was a rhetorical question.
“You have hurt others enough for them to be sent to the doctor, you took what isn’t yours. With how open you are about it I am surprised why it wasn’t passed on to law enforcement or people came forth as witnesses earlier. But they have now and it doesn’t look good.” Ms. Lynch said. “Your parents are going to jail because they are abusers and thieves. And you may not be an angel, but you are a product on how you are being raised. They didn’t treat you right either.”
“Mom and Dad love me, don’t you dare accuse them of being bad parents!” Dudley shouted.
“They loved you but are not good parents. They raised you with a sense of entitlement, to be cruel, to be greedy. That will not fly in the real world, that behavior is not rewarded.”
“I don’t care what you say, Mom and Dad told me they’d always cover for me and that I would never need to worry because they have the power and the money to give me anything I want.” Dudley said. He looked more like a four year old throwing a tantrum instead of a fourteen year old.
“They no longer have. They are arrested. They will have no more money. They are powerless. And you…you may go to juvey for what you did. And it will not be pretty. But since you’re young you can get leniency, if you can feel remorse for it and get your life together.” Ms. Lynch said.
“I want to get out of here! I don’t belong here! I want to go back home, I am hungry, I want my games and tv, I want to get my claws on Harry for tattling…” he became so violent as he shouted and turned red she had to restrain him. Luckily he was so out of shape that she had no problems. The therapist will have a field day, and time will tell if the damage the Dursleys did to their son will ever be fixed.
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Vernon Dursley and Petunia got seventeen years for child abuse, theft and embezzlement and if he ever got out, he had to pay back whatever he stole from the Potter fortune or the Grunnings company. Their assets were seized but it wouldn’t be enough. In jail, they were not popular and kicked around a lot. They don’t take kindly to abusers.
Vernon due to his poor health wouldn’t make it to half. Petunia would, but after she got out, unable to pay back any remaining debts would end up on the street. She would die there.
Marge only got ten years but like her brother didn’t make it. Her dogs were too far gone and had to be put out of their misery.
Dudley was in juvie until he was 18. While he and his friends were the bane of the neighborhood in Surrey, he was a small fish in a big pond in juvie and was utterly powerless. He learned what it was like to be on the other side for once. But oddly enough, when he left, he had learned his lesson. He decides to be a better man then his parents. Despite some difficulties, he got a job, mostly moving or clearing houses of apartments. It wasn’t luxurious but it was a living. He even got married and had kids.
He only saw Harry once, running into him by accident. He would apologize profusely and would vanish from his life. Harry didn’t need him to make his life more complicated. That changed though when one day an owl with an odd letter came for one of his kids…and Dudley would not make the same mistakes his parents made there.