Magical Criminalist

Information Occupation Magical Criminalist Involved Location(s) Ministry of Magicians Lore Credit(s) mn614, tqrpiar

Occupation Description

Activity Sectors: Criminal investigation, forensic studies

Competencies: Criminalist and criminological knowledge, knowledge of the law, literacy and numeracy, analytical/reasoning skills, knowledge of all areas of magic

Education required: At least an O- in Potions, Transfiguration, Charms, Herbology, and Defence Against the Dark Arts at H.A.T. level, at least an E in Alchemy, and at least an E+ in either Wandlore or Care of Magical Creatures at S.M.U.G. level

Fields of employment: Ministry of Magicians - Department of Magical Law Enforcement

Career History

Magical criminalists—or at least their Early Modern counterparts—have existed since the formation of the Ministry of Magicians. From the Ministry’s founding to the late 1700s, judges and enforcement officers were expected to make conclusive and punitive court decisions rooted almost exclusively in witness accounts, confessions, and petty divination—none of which were particularly reliable.

In 1782, the Ministry employee Verona Adhikari was assigned a difficult and personal task: to determine which of three highly suspected witches had poisoned her husband. Each witch refused to allow their memories to be extracted, and Adhikari was unwilling to resort to divination, as she considered it unreliable. In a famously ingenious set of actions, she used alchemy to draw the poison out of her husband’s body and used a tracking spell to trace the poison to a wine glass. Conducting a magical sweep of the area, she found evidence that the wine glass had been transfigured from a wooden box. She untransfigured the glass and used a tracking spell on the resulting box, which correctly led her to the criminal.

Realising her talent for using magic to investigate cases, Adhikari (with permission from the Minister) formed the Magical Investigator Office as a branch of the Department of Justice, which was renamed the Magical Criminalist Office in 1945.

Notable Criminalists

Verona Adhikari (1758-1823)

Founder of the Magical Investigator Office; especially skilled in alchemy and transfiguration, which she excelled in during her time as a Serpent at Hogsworth.

Sophocles Cirillo (1840-1881)

Known for solving the most cases (260) of any Magical Investigator/Criminalist during his career; he likely would have solved more if he had not been killed in 1881 by a murderer he was investigating.

Clarissa Conan (1997-present)

Born to a long line of influential seers; a former Raven who uses her family’s reliable prophecies to confirm her case conclusions or seek out new suspects.

Career Lifestyle

Magical criminalists are expected to have sharp minds and exceptional academic records. Two or three are typically assigned to each case, which is usually solved within one week to two months. Occasionally, it may take years to gather enough information, and some cases go unsolved. Along with Auralocks, criminalists are among the first dispatched to a crime scene. They are responsible for recording all immediate evidence and documenting traces of magic. Auralocks and other officers present them with witness accounts, suspect backgrounds, and other information while they investigate. Fieldwork includes untransfiguring tampered items, performing tracking spells, potion-making, and sometimes identification of plant or creature fibres. Certain features of crime scenes make their jobs much easier; for example, a wand left behind may point directly to the criminal involved or a paw print might indicate which magical creature was involved with a case. Paperwork mainly consists of recording all evidence and filing reports for conclusions. Since magical criminalists work with potentially hazardous areas of magic, they are expected to wear protective coverings whilst handling potions, using advanced spells, performing alchemy, or being exposed to possible diseases.

Trivia

• Students can assist Detectives and Magical Criminalists in Magical Crime Studies classes hosted by the Academics team.
• The Murder of Sophocles Cirrilo was extensively investigated, as a notable murder.