User blog:Arathorstories/Azeroth's Law: Jurisdiction

Okay. We're starting this series with a basic overview of a fairly important part of any legal system: Jurisdiction. Put simply, jurisdiction in this context is the area over which a State has authority (or where a specific body has authority, e.g. the Stormwind Guard or the Church Inquisitors).

In that area, that State's laws apply. For simplicity's sake, we'll use Stormwind. Stormwind's standard jurisdiction is pretty easy to understand: The provinces of Elwynn, Westfall, Redridge, and Duskwood are squarely part of Stormwind's territorial claims and thus, it's authority and law. So, the Laws of Stormwind apply only to crimes committed within that territory, right?

Well, not necessarily. There are other areas it may apply, and probably does: Marshtide Watch, Nethergarde Keep, Northern Stranglethorn, Valgarde, etc. The key difference is that these areas are either outside of Stormwind's territorial claims or in areas of disputed claim. Any such area is going to be tricky when it comes to what law applies when, but the rule of thumb is this: The law that applies is the one that the party coming after you uses, barring treaty obligations. Let's call this secondary jurisdiction for discussion's sake.

There's another complication. If there's a relevant nexus between the location of an offence and the Kingdom, the laws may apply even well outside of conventional jurisdiction. E.g., if one Stormwind citizen murders another in Ironforge, they may actually face the laws of Stormwind and not Ironforge. Why? Well, because the offence was committed by a citizen and on a citizen, and with Stormwind and Ironforge having good relations, there's what we call the nexus - a link between offence and home jurisdiction that overrides geographical distance. This normally applies only to serious crimes, however.

So, there's a very basic overview of three jurisdictions of the State. For discussion's sake, that's Primary, Secondary, and Nexus jurisdiction.

Next, we have the jurisdiction of other bodies. To illustrate, we'll start with the Church Inquisitors. Their mandate is to investigate only offences against the Church (and even then only of a certain nature) or by members of the clergy. That means that they do not have jurisdiction over simple thefts, assaults, or the like. Basically, if it's a secular offence, it has no business being handled by the Inquisition.

How about the Stormwind Guard? They have broader jurisdiction, which is to investigate and prevent criminal conduct in Stormwind. Now what that means is that, barring a Nexus, their jurisdiction is solely within Primary and Secondary jurisdiction claims, and only in criminal matters.

There are fringe cases, but this is a very basic overview for people interested in law RP to keep in mind.

Technical Fiddlies
For those interested on a more technical level, keep the following in mind:
 * Precedents apply only within their own jurisdiction. Stormshend v Smith applies only in Stromgarde, -not- in Gilneas or Stormwind.
 * Military bases and forces will either be governed by their own law or be considered to territory of their originating State legally.
 * There may be issues of international crime. Remember, just because someone committed a crime elsewhere does NOT insulate them automatically of charges. A proven murderer who happened to commit the crime across the border can still be tried - see the concept of the Nexus of jurisdiction.
 * Where legislation between states conflicts, you have what's called a Conflict of Laws. The best solution is generally to talk it out OOC between all parties, ensure everyone's alright with the ramifications of the options presented, and select one accordingly.
 * Bear in mind even with these that generally, a crime should be prosecuted under the laws of the territory where it occured. Anything else is generally just a fringe case or due to the lack of prosecution in the territory where the crime occurred. E.g., do not try an Ironforge citizen under IF law automatically if he breaks the law in Darnassus. Do so only where there is a compelling nexus and a good IC argument to do so.
 * The Deeprun Tram is a complicated issue. Like, really complicated.