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In Half-Blood Prince, when Harry meets Draco in the toilet and they begin to duel, at the time Harry hits Draco with Sectumsempra, Draco is mid-cast of the Crucio curse. Does Draco ever get punished for this?

I am sure that there would have been some leniency given due to Harry “beating” him to it with his curse, but Crucio is one of the worst curses to use, surely there would have been some punishment? (Although I guess you could also say the same thing for Harry at the end of Order of the Phoenix when he is trying to curse Bellatrix.)

Any canon preferred :-)

Ry-
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BP_Phoenix
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    Punished for almost casting a spell? Sounds a bit iffy to me. Where's the proof? – Valorum Feb 26 '15 at 10:10
  • self Defense Richard, surely there's a case for that? – BP_Phoenix Feb 26 '15 at 10:13
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    About Harry, please see http://scifi.stackexchange.com/q/52267/4918 Why was Harry Potter not sent to Azkaban? – b_jonas Feb 26 '15 at 10:24
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    Seems like at this time, laws are not well enforced anymore. I mean Harry could've made Draco bleed to death if it wasn't for Snapes' help and he doesn't really get any punishment. Harry used the Crucio curse on Bellatrix and nobody gave a damn. HE also broke into the ministry, also resulting in the destruction of hundreds of those prophecy orbs. Harry used the Imperio curse to gain access to Gringotts where he stole AND released a DRAGON over the city of London, full of Muggles and nobody cared. The Ministry seemed to have bigger Problems. – Dagon313 Feb 26 '15 at 10:38
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    Or J.K.Rowling just isn't consistent in her writing :) – Dagon313 Feb 26 '15 at 10:39
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    @ b_jonas - that question is about Harry's use of the curses for the 'greater good'. Draco using it in a duel is a different issue IMO. Maybe the answer is correct, as in Crouch allowing the use of the curses during the first war,so maybe a reason for leniency now, but this wasn't really in the middle of fighting the war, just a 'one-off' duel in the middle of school? – BP_Phoenix Feb 26 '15 at 10:52
  • One can consider the fact that Dumbledore "let" Draco get away with the cursed necklace and poison to not endanger him. I do believe Voldemort won't be pleased if Draco ends up in Azkaban, so I doubt Dumbledore would report it even if there was proof – Ka0s Feb 26 '15 at 12:02
  • Or the story is supposed to just be fun, and minor inconsistencies weren't considered important enough, or fixing them would make the story flow less fun. – Thought Feb 26 '15 at 16:18
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    Actually, he has to live his entire life being Draco Malfoy. Isn't that punishment enough? – corsiKa Feb 26 '15 at 19:03
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    @corsiKa - oodles of money, life of leisure. I don't see what the bad part for Draco is. – DVK-on-Ahch-To Feb 26 '15 at 21:45
  • @ErnestFriedman-Hill Draco Malfoy didn't kill Dumbledore. – TylerH Feb 27 '15 at 02:34
  • @DVK the bad part is the world hates him, and before the war is over he has to live with a bunch of crazy death eaters and from time to time Voldemort will force him to do stuff like torching some misbehaving death eaters. – Corvid Mar 11 '15 at 18:01
  • @Corvid - I don't know about you, but I'd swap havnig oodles of money and life of leisure for the world hating me any day. And he's sociopathic enough that torching death eaters ain't really something to eat at him – DVK-on-Ahch-To Mar 12 '15 at 13:30
  • Sociopathic? What makes you say that? I'm not trying to defend Draco or anything, he's a nasty little snot, that's for sure, but not sociopathic. – Corvid Mar 14 '15 at 03:43

2 Answers2

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There's no proof. It would be Draco's word against Harry's, and Harry is the one that just performed a Dark curse.

Besides this, it's Snape who arrives to sort it out, and even leaving aside the obvious overshadowing of this by the HBP stuff he's not exactly a big fan of Harry anyway. And consider that he was trying to worm information out of Draco that year, so even IF he believed Harry punishing Draco may not be the best move tactically.

DavidS
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Punished for almost casting a spell is a bit iffy, as there would be no proof. Also if memory serves, casting the spell is not enough, the castor actually has to want to Crucio, and it is unknown if Draco could do it. I think Moody said that he expected no student at Hogwarts could, and Harry had trouble using it against Bellatrix even after she just killed his godfather.

J. Patrick
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