Justice and laws

The Realms is a large world, and across it are a bewildering variety of local laws and edicts and ways of applying them. Edicts can be ruler proc¬lamations, but far more frequently are temporary laws and person-specific prohibitions instated by lower-ranking officials. These tend to have less weight at a trial than codified, formal laws unless they have stood for some time and been rein¬forced by many sentences.
The Laws of Secomber
The laws of Secomber are reproduced in this section, because they are typical of local legal codes throughout the Heartlands. These laws are modeled on Waterdeep’s Code Legal, with the fol¬lowing modifications.
In Waterdeep there are four plaints of crimes, the first and most serious of which is “crimes against the Lords,” or offenses against the gov¬ernment. There are no “crimes against Lords” in Secomber.
In Waterdeep, most crimes are heard by one of twenty-six magisters (commonly known as Black Robes, for their uniforms), but cases can be ap¬pealed to the Lord’s Court, which consists of the Open Lord of the city and two magisters, neither of whom is the magister whose decision is being appealed.
Rather than black-robed magisters, Secomber has Rods of Justice as its judges. These are re¬spected elders, nominated and voted into office for four-summer terms by the populace, and their total number varies from six to nine (as illness and crime rates necessitate). A Rod can be dis¬missed by a majority vote of the other Rods, can resign freely, and can excuse oneself from specific cases if he or she has a personal interest in the outcome (though Rods can’t be compelled to ex¬cuse themselves, even when a conflict of interest or bias is obvious).
All cases are heard by nine-member juries made up of landowners of Secomber, each cho¬sen randomly by a blindfolded local child (who in turn is randomly chosen by any priest who’s handy, or failing that by a Rod) who chooses name-bearing chits out of a cauldron. If a chit drawn is someone who has served on a jury within the previous year, the chit is discarded and a new chit is drawn as a replacement. All trials are pub¬lic, and often serve as entertainment for the idle. The accused parties are allowed to speak freely, though Rods can and do order them gagged if they spit obscenities or offer tirades or threats.
Spellcasting in court (without the express per-mission of the presiding Rod) is a severe crime; if done by an accused person, the defendant will be struck unconscious, bound, and gagged. Jus¬tice will then proceed with that person left thus restrained, with the punishment for spellcasting added to whatever sentence he or she might be given for the original crime. Attacking a Rod at any time is treated as both “aiding an attack upon Secomber” and “assault upon a citizen,” and the sentences for both apply. 
Trials are immediate (usually held within half a day), though a Rod can order a stay of proceed¬ings if there’s a wait to gain witnesses or evidence. As in Waterdeep’s Code Legal, these laws aren’t absolute rules, but rather guidelines. Rods and ju¬ries are free to set any sentence they want if guilt is determined. The inability to pay fines or dam¬ages is mitigated by seizure of the guilty person’s property, combined with enforced hard labor until enough coin is earned to satisfy the debt. Unlike in Waterdeep, there is no Lord’s Court or automatic appeal a party found guilty can make—but increasingly, over the years, the proc-lamation of new evidence coming to light has led to a nigh-automatic swift and informal retrial, or sometimes dismissal of the charges against a pris¬oner and the rewarding of freedom on the spot.

Secombers Code of Justice
Three general kinds of offenses exist in Secomber, to wit:
The category of godsfrowns (crimes against the gods) includes assaults against Secomber, most criminal activities that involve property loss or damage, and offenses of a personal nature that do not cause or lead to the death of the victim.
Deathseekings are crimes that directly involve death or that threaten to bring about death by their performance, including outright killing and other injurious behavior.
Deceits, malices, and threatenings make up the roster of lesser crimes. Some of these offenses, from the severity of their punishments, can be roughly equated to misdemeanors in the real world. Others (such as impersonating a Rod) are much more serious. 
Godsfrowns
Attacking Secomber:
This crime is defined as invading Secomber with intent to murder, pil¬lage, or set fires; the act of deliberately poisoning or fouling any food, water, or drinkable in Sec¬omber; casting spells to cause building collapses or effects reasonably expected to cause multiple deaths; or damage to city gates. If observed in the act by a Rod or Watch member, the offender is killed on the spot; otherwise the punishment for conviction is death.
Aiding an Attack upon Secomber:
This crime is defined as knowingly providing informa¬tion or assistance to outlander parties desiring to damage or steal property from Secomber, foul any well or pond in Secomber, or attack or kidnap or mutilate or maim any citizen of Secomber. The offender must pay damages to anyone affected by the attack, serve hard labor, and pay a fine to the city. Then the offender is exiled and banned from entering the city again.
Arson: The offender is sentenced to death or enforced hard labor, depending on the severity of the crime, then branded and exiled.
Defiling Holy Places or Temple Theft: The offender must pay damages and serve a term of hard labor. A public pronouncement forbids the convict from entering a holy place, and the of¬fender is often exiled from the city.
Public Blasphemy:
The offender is impris¬oned for half a day, or overnight if the trial is held in the evening.
Rape:
The offender pays damages to the vic¬tim. Then the miscreant is stripped, chained in public, flogged, and left chained until the next sunrise. Citizens can ridicule the miscreant, but face justice if they strike, hurl missiles that do lasting harm, or cast hostile magic on the mis¬creant. During the shackling, citizens are free to feed, tend, comfort, give medical aid, and try to warm the miscreant with fires, cloaks, et cetera, but they may not unchain him or her or entirely clothe him or her. Then the offender suffers muti¬lation and is thrown in a dungeon.
Spellcasting in Court:
The offender is flogged and shackled as described above, then fined and imprisoned for a tenday. This act is not a crime if it has the express prior permission of a Rod.

Theft: The thief must pay a fine to the city as well as damages to the victim, and is publicly flogged and shackled.
Tomb-Robbing:
The thief must pay a fine to the city and damages to the injured party (usually a relative of the tomb’s inhabitant), and is then branded as a tomb-robber.
Violation of Any Edict:
The offender is sen¬tenced to manual labor at the direction of the presiding Rod of Justice. This could mean re¬pairing walls or bridges, filling in potholes and washouts on roads, mending roofs or chimneys, shoveling or plowing snow in winter, or—the old fallback—cutting, splitting, and stacking fire¬wood. A fine also applies, plus a new trial if the violation involves new offenses against the Code.
Deathseekings
Assault upon a Citizen Resulting in Injury:
The offender must pay damages and is sentenced to either hard labor or public flogging and shack¬ling. (A citizen is one who owns land, pays rent, or has resided in Secomber or within view of its walls for at least a season.)
Assault upon an Outlander Resulting in Injury:
The offender must pay damages, possibly followed by light labor or a fine.
Harmful Public Spellcasting:
The caster must pay damages and a fine, serve a light labor sentence for up to a tenday, and is then exiled from the city for one full year. This category in¬cludes unleashing magic items. “Harmful” means resulting in damage to persons or property, or through fear or removal of support causing imme¬diate accident or suicide.
Murder:
A willful murder brings a death sen¬tence, but if the murder is judged unintentional, the miscreant might be flogged and shackled and then banned. In cases of justified killing (such as in the defense of self, spouse, or children), the offender is usually branded instead. Note that killings brought about by an attempt to prevent any crime in the Code receive lesser punishments (typically a fine paid to the city, or none at all), and adventurers or mercenaries who were hired to defend Secomber or to keep the peace cannot receive sentences more severe than a fine. Acquit¬tals are usual in cases of murder done to someone who threatens the accused with a weapon after having just publicly committed a murder.
Deceits, Malices, and Fhreatenings
Bribery or Attempted Bribery:
The pun¬ishment includes light labor, a fine, and a public pronouncement prohibiting the offender from en¬gaging in any activity related to the bribe.
Dealing in Stolen Goods:
The fence pays a fine and damages, both based on the Rod’s esti¬mation of value of stolen goods.
Forgery of Currency or Legal Document or Posted Notice:
The forger must serve a term of hard labor or imprisonment, and must also pay damages.
Fraud:
The miscreant is branded and must pay both damages and a fine.
Hampering Justice:
This crime is defined as refusing to testify, hiding from the Watch, pre¬venting the Watch from entry or impeding the Watch’s chasing of someone or seizure of some¬thing. The offender must pay a fine and serve a sentence of hard labor.
Impersonating a Rod of Justice, a Member of the Watch, or an Ordained Priest:
The of¬fender is fined and exiled.
Intimidation or Blackmail:
The offender must pay a fine and damages, and endures public flogging and shackling.
Obstruction:
In most cases, this offense amounts to parking a wagon or conveyance against a doorway or across an alley or other route, so it can’t easily be traversed. The offender must pay damages, and a public edict forbids him or her from driving a wagon in the city for a specified period. If the city gate was blocked, the sentence also includes imprisonment for one full day and night.
Resisting Arrest:
The offender is imprisoned for one day, then flogged and shackled. If the accused is deemed to be too weak to endure flog¬ging and shackling, a fine is levied instead.
Vandalism:
The vandal pays a fine and dam¬ages and is then flogged and shackled. If the damage is to a garden, or is merely cosmetic, pay¬ment of damages is usually the only punishment.
Laws of Daily Life
In addition to the codified laws discussed here, Secomber and almost every other settlement large enough to hold a market that noncitizens come to, all across Faerun, have a patchwork of accu¬mulated “civic laws.” These are akin to real-world
bylaws and regulations, and they govern how buildings are built (to minimize fire risk), when and where certain activities—particularly those that are noisy, such as building construction—can be carried out, and various prohibitions that have been put in place on a case-by-case basis to settle local disputes. (“Owing to insufferable stenches, Thaeler the furrier is not to park a wagon of raw hides, nor any uncured furs, against this wall or within two lance-lengths of any part of this wall, said lances being held straight out from the wall in line with each other.”) A first-time offender against a civic law receives a warning, pays a fine, and must promise not to reoffend. Penalties for repeat offenders escalate.
PROPERTY LAW
Generally, formal laws regarding possessions and property exist only in kingdoms and other organized countries. Otherwise, might makes right, and the law is whatever the local lord or kingpin says.
In reality, this brute force, “My sword is the law” approach is always tempered by custom. Customs are formed by the habits of genera¬tions, built up into “the way things are done,” as well as by the expectations of locals (“You can push us, self-styled ‘lord,’ but only so far: my grandsire built that fence and my sire expanded it—tear it down and on their graves I swear I’ll tear,y0tt down!”) and by the unwritten “rules of wayfaring” as understood by caravan merchants, peddlers, pilgrims, and envoys, and enforced by priests and the Heralds.
An example of this policing: “If you set up an inn and then murder everyone who stops there and keep their goods, even if that’s morally ac¬ceptable to you as a devout follower of Bane or of Cyric, it will not be suffered to stand. Once word gets out, expect to be soon destroyed by several caravans arriving at once intent on murdering you. Or failing that, expect to be shunned and ig¬nored, with no one visiting you for any reason—so it would be best for you if there’s absolutely noth¬ing you need by way of trade, ever again, from now until the end of your life.”
Centuries of disputes all over the Realms have led to property laws that are usually akin to this arrangement: You can charge fees for the use 
of your land, or you can fence off your land and guard it, with notices, prohibiting all or specific uses of it—but you can’t simply butcher, maim, imprison, or rob individuals you find on your land. Moreover, you can’t flout local customs with regard to buying and selling land, or renting land to farmers to till, or providing stable and paddock space and room and board to travelers.
Border disputes between neighbors might be settled with violence, or by documents and rules and solemn (church or Herald-witnessed) agree¬ments. Borders between nobility or rulers or countries are always solemnized somehow, usually with agreements or treaties arising out of wars and enforced by periodic border patrols or even garrisons. Often, for clarity and convenience, such borders follow a river, a mountain range, a road, or a tiny, meandering stream. Miscreants fleeing across a border can’t depend on protection from their destination unless there are patrols or garrisons at the border. Without a patrol or gar¬rison to guard the border, those in pursuit of the fleeing miscreants will simply follow them, ignor¬ing the boundary.
Slavery
Officially illegal almost everywhere in known Faerun, except in Dambrath, Thay, and the Old Empires, the practice of slavery is known to be widespread in most eastern lands.
Which doesn’t mean it doesn’t go on in many other places. In the cold Savage North, ores take human slaves whenever they can—and eat slaves who are no longer considered useful. In the chill wilderlands north of the Moonsea, “beast-men” (ogres) capture humans for use as slaves and food. There has always been a thriving slave trade in Sembia, Westgate, and Marsember, but by the very nature of the business as practiced in that part of the Realms, there aren’t named, high¬profile groups of slave takers. Rather, it’s always a few individuals doing snatch-and-grab jobs and fetching captives, who are often drugged to keep them silent, eating and drinking little, and not trying to escape. The slavers then drag their cap¬tives to a hiding place they control, from which “the goods” can readily be transferred to the ship of a captain who is covertly dealing in slaves. This is an important source of income for some Sea of Fallen Stars pirates.
There aren’t a lot of ship captains involved, but there are a lot of little slaving cabals. Each is composed of a dozen people at most, and half of those are usually guards and “heave the drugged bodies” muscle, with six at most being the ac¬tive snatchers and thinkers. Many of these cabals can, if someone starts to hunt or hound them, call on the occasional assistance of evil wizards and priests in return for bodies to experiment on or use in rituals.
Because of the small, secretive, informal na¬ture of these gangs, there’s little official mention of slavers. Unofficially, Faerûnians hear a lot of horrific tales about slavers snatching innocent folk, causing them to be hated and feared. Folk in Marsember tend to be blasé about slavers, and Sembians know and accept that hiring someone to have a rival, a fellow heir, or a creditor “re¬moved” is a daily business option. But Dalefolk and rural Cormyreans will grab pitchforks and at¬tack suspected slavers on sight.
Lawyers
-THO quoted by the Sage, 14/11/13 Qs for Ed
The role of adjudicating legal agreements is carried out by at least four groups, depending on where you are in the Realms:
1.heralds (who concern themselves most with definitions and identifications, such as whether you are the "Hrundar the Potter" named on the parchment, and what is meant by "my best wagon")
2.courtiers
3.local Black Robes (magistrates)
4.clerics of many deities (such as Tyr)
Now, if you're looking for "independent of government" representatives, their role is filled in larger cities (all capitals along the Sword Coast, for example, and in Sembia) by the hired "advocates" Ed has mentioned in the past. Courtiers and Black Robes tend to make rulings strongly supportive of what rulers tell them to say, or in "lock step" support of existing government policy . . . but then, that's the real-world situation, too, almost everywhere.
-Ed 24/12/13, responding to query about information in Power of Faerun
Q: In the Realms licensed lawyers do not exist but that sometimes there are unprofessional and not necessarily law-expert advocates. I just wanted to ask him if according to him this has changed in the Realms since the date covered in the product after all the time advances.
A: Nothing has changed regarding licensing (in that a few city rulers have tried to establish laws regarding who can and who cannot speak as advocates in legal matters besides plaintiffs, the accused, and the local authorities, but these laws have been ignored or rejected, and so haven't "taken hold," and attempts by lawyers to establish guilds exclusive to such legal advocates have been rejected by local authorities [[though in several cases local scribes' guilds have "added" legal advocates as members, and are getting away with it]].
However, the numbers, influence, and general level of expertise in details of local laws of legal advocates is rising swiftly and shows no signs of abating. So there are now many lawyers, though they may not be called that, and they are generally still NOT regulated.