Justicar Report

   20

Justicar Report

Chamber of Justice Communique #013a

On this day, February 15, 2007 of the Liberated Brotherhood, I the

Justicar of the Brotherhood now announce the punishment that this

Chamber lays upon Krath Priest Kromtal Stormfyld.

Upon the conclusion of fair and just proceedings, this Chamber

finds you:

On the Charge of Disreputable Behavior - You willingly and

knowingly partook in action that brought disrepute to the

Brotherhood as a whole, after being warned to cease. This action

included repeatedly defacing the Emperor's Hammer Wookieepedia

page with increasing severity, up to the point of publishing GA

Ronin's name, home phone number, and address - and encouraging

people to visit him at home. These acts were not in the best

interest of the Brotherhood and you were aware of this when he

repeatedly committed said acts - this Chamber finds you GUILTY.

Sentencing for the party is as follows:

i) Demotion from Krath Priest to Dark Jedi Knight

ii) Official Letter of Reprimand entered in your file

iii) One year of Probation

The terms of probation are thus:

-The guilty party may not receive promotion, appointment to

position, or any citation or honor of merit without the explicit

permission of the Justicar

-In addition, he may not hold any leadership position until his

probationary period expires

Signed and Sealed in Justice,

Dark Side Adept Kir Taldrya Katarn

Justicar and High Protector of the Dark Brotherhood


Chamber of Justice Communique #013b

Justicar's Opinion – Case #008 DB vs. Kromtal Stormfyld

The complaint brought against Kromtal Stormfyld was that of

Disreputable Behavior. He was accused of vandalizing the

Emperor's Hammer wookieepedia page several times, finally posting

Ronin's home phone number and address, and encouraging members to harass him at home. He was warned several times to cease this behavior but did not heed the warnings. This complaint was originally brought to Justicar Firefox, who began an investigation of the event. Unfortunately real life events prevented him from completing the case, and it was passed onto me to finish.

The evidence collected included copies of the several different

posts made by Kromtal, matched by both IP and known alias. These

posts caused harm to the Brotherhood's image and to the relations

between our club and the Emperor's Hammer. The Disreputable

Behavior rule states that actions taken by members outside of club

activities that reflect on the club can be prosecuted, and in this

case Kromtal willingly acted against the clubs best interest.

Kromtal was formally approached with the charge against him and

offered the standard time to plea, however he responded with

several emails in which he refused to plea and contested the

Chamber's authority over him.

After several warnings and consultations with the Left Hand of Justice, Kromtal still refused to plea, and after the plea period ended, an assumed guilty plea was entered in the record as is precedent in the Brotherhood. This was followed by the sentencing period, during which it was decided Kromtal would be demoted from Krath Priest to Dark Jedi Knight, have an Official Letter of Reprimand put into his dossier, and serve one year on probation.

Signed and Sealed in Justice,

Dark Side Adept Kir Taldrya Katarn

Justicar and High Protector of the Dark Brotherhood

I have to say that all-in-all that is pretty harsh. With a one year probation, and demotion considering that amazingly Krom hasnt been much trouble in his time in the DB. While I am in no position to pass judgement on the CoJ, maybe yall should cut back on the punishment a bit.

The sentence was agreed upon by the entire CoJ as appropriate in this case and in order with precedent. If you had seen all the posted comments, the defendant's response, and his repeated ignoring of instructions to cease his activity, you would most likely agree with the sentence. Also, probation doesn't prevent him from being an active member, it just requires the Justicar's approval for things such as awards, promotions, etc.

I also forgot to add that you should remember Kromtal posted the real life HOME phone number and address of Ronin. Despite how people may feel about the EH, this is a gross intrusion of personal privacy that we can absolutely not allow here, or no one will feel comfortable being a DB member.

While the punishment is harsh and I'm sure upon reflection Kromtal would have opted out of such actions. But, be that as it may, actions like that effect the face of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood as a whole and may negatively effect the influx of membership.

Any action that gives the DJB a poor reputation should come with a harsh penalty as membership and reputation is the lifeblood of the club and affects all members. I say the sentence, while harsh, is just.

Poor grammar ftl. hits head against wall

Harsh? At least he gets to remain in the DJB.

Fair? Just? these are opinions that are not required of us. The COJ exists for one purpose, to enact punishment. Rehabilitation does not equate into the mix. As judgement has been passed, i suggest we accept it, at prima facia, as that is all that is required of us. To produce comments, in my opinion, disputing or affirming a decision made by the COJ is counterproductive to the judiciary process.

Tib, negative comments are not necessarily counterproductive. if it is well-arguemented, it can even be productive. criticism keeps people sharp. if the CoJ would not be accepting criticism, there would also not be an appeals panel.

so, long story short, if Kromtal decides he does not agree with things, he can try to appeal. if not, the ruling stands. and then, yes, it is of no use to comment here. only Kromtal can decide now. :P

Likewise, its silly to say that positive comments are bad as well. I'm sure the CoJ as much as anyone wants to hear that they are doing a good job.

does this mean we cant visit ronin?

I don't mind comments at all, but I post these as a notice to the DB on what the CoJ is doing. If you have comments, questions, or ideas I'd appreciate it if everyone would just email them to me. So let's end this gigantic comment thread, heh, thanks.

You could always remove the ability to add comments on postings like these.

We tried explaining this to him, BF :P

Just to explain about the comments stuff, you can't remove that opotion if you submit a "report". Since I'm assuming Kir wants these easily archived, making each Communique a report is the easiest solution. He could make it into a regular news post, where you can remove the "Comments" option, but then the news gets lost and so on and so forth.

I like pie.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that you could remove the comments section from the database itself, even from reports. I was pretty sure I had seen Yacks and Jac do it before, but I could be wrong. That's what I was talking about.

And for the record, Ziggy does not like pie. He lies. He's a Kaek man.

Nope...Not possible with reports. :(

I could probably make it possible, but it's not a super-high priority of mine atm as far as coding goes.
Jac

Where should I start? I mean, I have a lot I could say about this situation, it's really hard to even think of where to begin.

I guess I could first state that the page that gave out Ronin's information wasn't done with my Wookieepedia username, it's an IP, and not even my IP. My IP range starts with 67, the offending page was edited by an IP in the 38 range.

Or, I could simply suggest that Wookieepedia doesn't fall under the CoJ's jurisdiction and that the entire proceeding was a sham, which is why I refused to cooperate, refused to submit a plea, and refused to defend myself.

I've done nothing but good work for this club and this is how I'm repaid. If you ask me, it only serves to prove something that many have been saying for the last year: this club is heading down the same path as the EH.

Yes, I could appeal. I feel that my Member's Rights have been violated, but I don't see it being worth the effort. This was a thinly veiled attempt to put me in my place for whatever reason, the motive I've not yet figured out since I've been inactive for the last 5 months or so. Either way, I was practically gone before this show-trial and now that it's over I'm going to be completely gone.

I think this case sets a dangerous precedent, it shows that anything you do on the internet can get you in trouble in the DJB, regardless of where it's done. Even if you don't mention the DJB at all or even acknowledge you have any affiliation whatsoever with the DJB. I suppose this is kind of like the DJB's own version of the Patriot Act. The CoJ can do what they want, when they want to anyone who is a member of the club no matter where in the online world the event occurs.

As I said, I'm not going to appeal anything. The punishment was unduly harsh, but I really don't care. The time in my life where I feel a need to belong to an online club to boost my own ego or esteem has long since passed. In many ways I felt out of place in the DJB anyway, I'm an old relic who's time has come and gone, there are so many up-and-comers that there's really no room for someone with a more old-school way of looking at things, but such is the way of things.

Clubs evolve and the social moires change, I just didn't change with them. I've always felt an abiding honor and loyalty to my unit above my own desires for advancement, a quite unpopular sentiment these days. It's all about how far you can go, what medals you can get, what positions you can hold. It's no longer about what you can do for your team, what you can do for your house, or what you can do for your clan.

I may pop up from time to time on IRC, who knows. If I do, you can bet the only place you'll find me is going to be Tarentum's channel. I feel nothing at all toward the DJB as a whole anymore, but I still feel that I have a place in Tarentum in some way and that my company will be not only accepted there, but welcomed.

So, I bid you all a fond farewell. Some of you I didn't know as well as I wanted to, others I grew to know all too well and wish I hadn't. There's still a few people in this club that I respect, though some of that respect has worn away in last year.

In closing, I hope you all have a great time doing whatever it is you do in the club, and I really hope that the precedent set by this case isn't the start of a trend that leads to even more violations of the rights of the members of the club. As it stands, you no longer have the right to post things on sites completely unrelated to the DJB without fear of repercussions, who knows what could be next...

Where should I start? I mean, I have a lot I could say about this situation, it's really hard to even think of where to begin.

I guess I could first state that the page that gave out Ronin's information wasn't done with my Wookieepedia username, it's an IP, and not even my IP. My IP range starts with 67, the offending page was edited by an IP in the 38 range.

Or, I could simply suggest that Wookieepedia doesn't fall under the CoJ's jurisdiction and that the entire proceeding was a sham, which is why I refused to cooperate, refused to submit a plea, and refused to defend myself.

I've done nothing but good work for this club and this is how I'm repaid. If you ask me, it only serves to prove something that many have been saying for the last year: this club is heading down the same path as the EH.

Yes, I could appeal. I feel that my Member's Rights have been violated, but I don't see it being worth the effort. This was a thinly veiled attempt to put me in my place for whatever reason, the motive I've not yet figured out since I've been inactive for the last 5 months or so. Either way, I was practically gone before this show-trial and now that it's over I'm going to be completely gone.

I think this case sets a dangerous precedent, it shows that anything you do on the internet can get you in trouble in the DJB, regardless of where it's done. Even if you don't mention the DJB at all or even acknowledge you have any affiliation whatsoever with the DJB. I suppose this is kind of like the DJB's own version of the Patriot Act. The CoJ can do what they want, when they want to anyone who is a member of the club no matter where in the online world the event occurs.

As I said, I'm not going to appeal anything. The punishment was unduly harsh, but I really don't care. The time in my life where I feel a need to belong to an online club to boost my own ego or esteem has long since passed. In many ways I felt out of place in the DJB anyway, I'm an old relic who's time has come and gone, there are so many up-and-comers that there's really no room for someone with a more old-school way of looking at things, but such is the way of things.

Clubs evolve and the social moires change, I just didn't change with them. I've always felt an abiding honor and loyalty to my unit above my own desires for advancement, a quite unpopular sentiment these days. It's all about how far you can go, what medals you can get, what positions you can hold. It's no longer about what you can do for your team, what you can do for your house, or what you can do for your clan.

I may pop up from time to time on IRC, who knows. If I do, you can bet the only place you'll find me is going to be Tarentum's channel. I feel nothing at all toward the DJB as a whole anymore, but I still feel that I have a place in Tarentum in some way and that my company will be not only accepted there, but welcomed.

So, I bid you all a fond farewell. Some of you I didn't know as well as I wanted to, others I grew to know all too well and wish I hadn't. There's still a few people in this club that I respect, though some of that respect has worn away in last year.

In closing, I hope you all have a great time doing whatever it is you do in the club, and I really hope that the precedent set by this case isn't the start of a trend that leads to even more violations of the rights of the members of the club. As it stands, you no longer have the right to post things on sites completely unrelated to the DJB without fear of repercussions, who knows what could be next...

I'm not going to argue the case on a comment thread, the CoJ made it's decision and it is final.

Our jurisdiction comes from the fact that Kromtal is a DB member, this post was made in the online Star Wars community, and there is an existing DB-EH relationship that is one of the causes behind the vandalism.

As for the sentence - a 1 rank demotion and probation is on the very low end of punishments available to the CoJ, pretty far from "harsh".

I would like to point out that the appropriate place to make arguments on his own behalf would have been during the trial, not a comment thread.

Please let this be the end to the comments posted here. Anything else can be emailed to me as I previously requested.

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