16 October 2011

In a few short weeks, the Wizengamot will again hear the case of Leo Gamp.

A former Auror, Leo Gamp was arrested in 1998 shortly after the Battle of Hogwarts on charges of murder, torture, and kidnapping. The arrest came as a shock to the Wizarding World, still reeling from the war. He’d had a clean record, and by all accounts was a decorated and respected member of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

Only months after his arrest, he was sentenced by the Wizengamot to life in Azkaban with no possibility of release.

Time-turn forward to today: Genevieve Garcia-Gamp, journalist and estranged wife of Leo Gamp, has just been informed that Gamp has been granted the opportunity to argue for early release, on grounds that his prosecution was bungled.

I sat down with Mrs. Garcia-Gamp to get a better picture of what’s going on.

Garcia-Gamp described a young Gamp as a wizard with,  “a career as an Auror ahead of him and a smile that every girl ogled over… he was smart, attentive and kind. He promised me the world.”

They eloped in 1989, Garcia-Gamp leaving Hogwarts early. She, like everyone else who knew Gamp, never saw the change coming.

“I’ve spent many nights over the years lying awake and going over every one of those final encounters with Leo. I’ve watched those memories and dissected them. People still question if I really was oblivious. Maybe it was stupidity. But I honestly can’t see or remember any signs and trust me I’ve tried,” Garcia-Gamp recollected.

But everything changed during Gamp’s trial. Garcia-Gamp described the threats from her husband:

“He tried to launch himself across the table at me. There was something really dark there that I never saw before. He called me an unfit mother.”

Since then, she has tried to move on with her life, raising her young son on her own, and building a flourishing business. She had to find out about the new developments from Gamp himself last Saturday, even though she’d been in contact with Solomon Carstairs, the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement only a week before.

“As you can imagine, I was rather angry that no one from Level Two or the Ministry at all had contacted me in mere warning that this might happen.”

Garcia-Gamp looked for answers but felt she was met with a callous disregard, her career as an author and journalist apparently used as grounds to keep her in the dark.

She described how she was told that she, “should perhaps make more friends on Level Two.”

This is not the first time the Daily Prophet has become aware of personal bias in the DMLE against Mrs. Garcia-Gamp: earlier this month an investigation into a magical assault by a high-ranking Ministry of Magic official at Garcia-Gamp’s place of business yielded only a slap on the wrist.

Garcia-Gamp told the Daily Prophet that her only concern is the safety of her son, and that justice is done.

“If he’s released, he’ll be coming after my son and I won’t be able to do anything about it. My twelve-year-old boy caught in the middle and he’s not asked for any of this.” She added, “my son will be deeply affected by all of this.”

However, “... if there was uncontroversial proof, evidence that cleared his name beyond a shadow of a doubt, I will be the first to welcome him home as a free man.”

The Daily Prophet has conducted extensive research on Leo Gamp’s original trial, and at this point in time the most compelling evidence in Gamp’s favor was that the Ministry’s prosecuting attorney was none other than Theodora Kingstreet, who is currently serving a life sentence in Azkaban for her own crimes of murder and treason. Kingstreet had been found to be a capable forger and deft at manipulating the legal system. According to sources inside the Wizengamot, Gamp’s legal representation claims that any case related to Kingstreet is tainted and must be re-examined.

I asked her what she hopes will come of all this.

“I want to see the Ministry finally make a decision and then leave us all in peace to deal with the aftermath.... I’d like to say that I had every confidence in the Ministry to get it right. But, as I said, it’s damage limitation, isn’t it? Do they want to leave it as is, release a criminal, or admit they locked an innocent man up for more than a decade?”