The ZRT welcomes the verdict of the Magistrate's Court in the case of People v. Eiríc S. Börnatfiglheu as a victory - nay, a quantum leap - for justice in Talossa.
Erik - for so I still think of him - was a trustworthy citizen of the Talossan Republic, twice Seneschál, and - at one time - an active leader in both the ZRT and the Peculiarist movement in the reunited Kingdom. However, I was aware of his ongoing health problems throughout this time, which occasionally led him to erratic and bizarre behaviour. For this reason, when it came to light that he had in fact forged 18 sock-puppet citizens and artificially inflated the ZRT vote in the 45th Cosâ elections thereby, I was shocked, angry, ashamed... but not really surprised, if you get what I mean.
The victory for justice in the Magistrate's Cort ruling is two-fold. Firstly, the penalty against Erik for truly epic levels of immigration and electoral fraud - more than 15 years civil disability, a fine in cold hard capitalist dollars, and 500 hours community work, with banishment suspended pending successful completion of the above. We may quibble about precise numbers, but let us be clear - we now have a precedent in Talossa that there are ways of punishing wrongdoers other than expulsion.
To do otherwise - to simply declare that a "bad guy" just gets his citizenship withdrawn - is what a voluntary society, like the Rotary Club, would do. It is an impermissible breach of the wall between executive and judicial action. It is what King Robert I used to do - run his political enemies out of Talossa, occasionally by trumped-up Cort charges. It is what a political leadership which acts like a boy's club, and which thinks of Talossa as a boy's club, would do. But it is not appropriate for a nation among the nations of the world.
The second victory is the Cort's injunction against the initial recognition of Eiríc's renunciation of citizenship, on the crucial grounds that this was not made publically by the citizen himself. Hopefully this will stand up on any appeal that will be made. The real issue here is not whether Eiríc was or was not "under duress" from our Head of State at the time he communicated his wish to renounce. (I personally am sure that Erik did intend to renounce at the time he told the King so.) It is that Erik did not make the public statement himself, as required by law.
It is also that the Head of State - as is confirmed by the "Talossaleaks" materials - acted as he did with the express intention of avoiding an ugly, drawn-out Cort case. Our King, in this case, used his concurrent powers as Wittenberg admin to take a "short cut" - to get Eiríc to renounce his citizenship to save us all a lot of bother - in what he saw as the immediate interests of the country. This was the same sort of short cut which Count Hooligan - according, again, to the "Talossaleaks" material - took to enable Timoþi Asmorescu to get out of recusing himself from judgement in a case where he was the investigator. We hope to see that trial go to court very soon, so that another mighty blow for Talossan justice can be made.
The political point to be gained by this is that it is dangerous for those in authority to take "legal short cuts" in order to "save" the country, or "save" us from legal technicalities. It reminds me of the scene in LA Confidential where Dudley Smith challenges Ed Exley to forge evidence to convict a known criminal. You can't do that without shooting large holes through the fabric of the rule of law.
The question of whether the Head of State should have "emergency powers" is a much wider political one. But the ZRT's political point here is that in the investigation of the ESB, the King and the governing party of the time took impermissible short-cuts; firstly, because of the dangerous double role of Head of State and Wittenberg Admin; second, because of a culture of legal impunity. Richard Nixon told David Frost that "it's not illegal if the President does it". We fear there is an ideology among many long-term leaders of Talossa that it's not illegal if the King, or the sworn defenders of the King, do it.
We stand for power in Talossa to be held only by democratically accountable authorities, either elected or responsible to elected officials. We stand for the separation of Witt Admin and political leadership. We stand for a judiciary which does its job, as Magistrate Nordselvâ has done here. And we hope to see our old friend Eiríc Börnatfiglheu resume his (non-political) life as a citizen, pay his debt to society, and earn the right to be trusted by his fellow citizens again.
Miestrâ Schivâ
ZRT co-founder and leader
