And character you recognise is not mine.
Casper Williams was a young man. At thirty, he had the sense, the ambition to run for and claim as his own the position of Minister for Magic. A prestigious title for anyone; even more so at his age. He was one of the youngest to ever run, let alone win.
The papers loved him. After all, he wasn't a bad looking chap: quite tall, short brown hair, hazel eyes. Not handsome, perhaps, not a pin up, but distinguished looking, that was what he liked to think. He cut a dashing picture in his well-made suits, his designer robes. Of course he came from a family of money. Old money. Perhaps the money more important that the pure blood trait at the moment, not that he had used that as a campaign slogan. He was a member for the public. That was his favourite; a man for the people. He knew what they wanted, and was able to go out there and make those changes for them.
Of course, times had been favourable for him. He knew what the public wanted after seeing Voldemort vanquished. The wizarding world was in chaos, and he had promised to bring order to that chaos.
He was an intelligent man. It didn't take a genius to work out that the population was living in fear. The analysts liked to write about the "power vacuum" that had allowed Casper to step into the prestigious role. With Fudge the victim of a landslide vote of no confidence, and most of the senior politicians either victims of Fudge, or Voldemort, there was very little choice for the top post. It didn't make it a bad thing that he was voted. It didn't even mean that he didn't deserve his chance at the top.
And he was ambitious in his role. He had promised sweeping changes, and he had certainly delivered. Sundown curfews, a no tolerance approach to violence. The arrest of Harry Potter.
Because Casper Williams was intelligent and certainly ambitious and he knew he had to start his career with a bang. Unfortunately, intellect, ambition were untempered by youth, and Casper Williams could certainly not be described as a wise man. His experience was brought through top education, through business school. Not life, not living through the bad times and surviving, not doing all he could do to have a life in even the darkest of times. He had done what he considered the smart thing and been in France during the second war.
It had certainly been a stunning blow for the newly elected Minister- front news for several weeks. Violence levels at their lowest since the war. He'd even managed to curtail the inevitable demonstrations, through a rash of back door laws making public demonstration illegal on the grounds of public safety. Add public safety to any law, and it was almost bound to pass through.
Casper Williams had never met Harry Potter, but like all wizards and witches, he felt he knew him. He was a teenager when Harry Potter had initially become famous. He had partied all night with the downfall of the Dark Lord, more because he was always looking for fun, rather than out of any particular strong feeling to the end of the Dark Lord's reign. There had been nothing on the Boy Who Lived for a long time, till well after it was confirmed he was attending Hogwarts. Then the by now infamous Tri-wizard tournament had thrown him back in the limelight full throttle. He had watched in wonder as a single newspaper trashed the boy; the public going from loving to hating the boy within a heart beat. The destruction of the boy's name had been impressive, and now emulated by Casper himself. Easy when the reading population believed every word reported by their loving Daily Prophet.
Of course there were people who still believed in their precious saviour. That sent him endless letters, or lobbied him daily. There were articles in almost any paper he picked up about whether it was right to punish Harry Potter for the crime of using an Unforgivable when it had been used against someone so cruel and hated as Lord Voldemort.
But alongside every article was the threat of more violence; for ever article there was doubting the authenticity of putting Harry Potter on trail, there were several on how bad society had become, the violence, the fear, all linked of course, however ambiguously to one Harry Potter. Casper Williams might not have been wise, but he was also not stupid. He knew who the most powerful wizard in the world was considered to be. And even if it wasn't true (although he strongly doubted it to be not) he knew how the public thought. Harry Potter had destroyed Lord Voldemort with a single spell. And whilst details of the spell were unknown, how could it have not been an unforgivable that had been used in the destruction of Voldemort. And whilst Casper Williams knew that people were grateful for the destruction, they still lived in fear, and as such were looking for a leader. And the only way Casper Williams knew of to get total run of the Ministry was to destroy the one hope of the Wizarding population and laud himself as the leader of the Wizarding world.
Casper Williams stood outside the door of Harry Potter's cell, watching the young man sleeping fitfully, and thought of the upcoming trial. This man would go to prison for his actions. And Casper Williams would stand in his place, the most celebrated wizard of this world.