Attention: Council Chairman Wyric Crowshire and Watch Sergeant Lothor ((Niether of these people are NPCs))

To whom it may concern,

My name is Ingrid Mordis, and I am a tax-paying, law-abiding citizen of the City of Sanctuary who has become the target of a campaign of religious persecution by a certain member of the Sanctuary Watch. His name is Swift, his rank is Corporal.

I know that all of you have more important matters to deal with than the disposition of a single Watchman toward a single citizen. Know then that if my case did not touch on issues affecting all citizens laboring under the force of law, I would not waste your valuable time with it.

For the sake of brevity, I am not including the full account of my ordeal with Corporal Swift, but do not mistake those omissions for deception. I will freely answer any question put to me about this matter. Contrary to what Corporal Swift believes, I do not hide behind cowardly lies.

I was convicted on a charge of conspiracy, the nature of which has still not been revealed even to me. The law is unmistakable. A criminal conspiracy must have a motive, and no motive for my alleged conspiracy was ever furnished by the Watchman who even now continues to persecute me and my associates.

Supported addendum for Conspiracy It is the council's intention that conspiracy shall be planning criminal acts with, harboring, or otherwise rendering aid to, an enemy of Sanctuary.

The Watchman also said at my trial that I was in possession of the tools of necromancy. I strongly doubt this, but as I found those things on the corpse of a dead drow, I do not claim to know their origin or purpose. I do not dispute that charge, as I am in no position to do so.

However, as the records will also show, it was never proven that I "planned criminal acts" with anyone, or otherwise rendered aid to this man at all. If merely interacting with this Scholar on a human level constitutes a crime of conspiracy, then the entire staff and patronage of the Pissing Crone Inn should also be prosecuted as my co-conspirators.

In truth, the man called "the Scholar" comes and goes as he pleases in Lower Sanctuary, and this Watchman has done nothing to stop him. If the spies of the city can establish that I was speaking with this man in the Crone, a fact I have never denied, why did this Watchman not simply capture him then? Am I to pay the price for his failure to act?

Most disturbing of all, this Watchman made bold to usurp the lawful authority of the elected Councilor who set my sentence. Councilor Donrick was most lenient in his sentencing, perhaps because of the thin legal basis for the charge. My sentence was simple: do not leave the Upper city, and report to the Watch daily.

But yesterday this Watchman took it upon himself to order me without cause or provocation to clean the stocks, "as part of your parole," he said. When I refused his unlawful demand, he threatened me with non-compliance and arrested me to the stocks, whereupon I was assaulted with rotten food, insulted, and degraded as a woman. He did this in a public place, and I have the names of eyewitnesses to the shameful disgrace if they are needed.

Corporal Swift has also attempted to entrap me into violating the terms of my parole. Enlisting the aid of a man I know only as Nate, he offered to allow me to leave the city legally, claiming to have the authority to do so. As I am forbidden by a Councilor's decree to leave the city under pain of death, it would have been a simple matter for Corporal Swift to strike me down as soon as I set foot outside the gates. He would have certainly failed in the attempt, but I never gave him the chance.

I will not trouble you with the intricate details of this shocking outrage; suffice to say there are witnesses to this as well, and it would be my pleasure to furnish them.

This Helmite Watchman knows that there is only one thing I fear: the wrath of Dread Bane. He has told me to my face that his intent is to "rescue me" from my own freewill choices. I have searched the lawbooks, and proper fear of the Black Hand is not a crime in Sanctuary.

I welcome the Corporal's hatred, with it he serves my Lord at the expense of his own. But I will not stand by idly while this Watchman seeks to criminalize what he cannot control.

Another woman of Sanctuary, Salvadora Santiago, has come under the unwanted scrutiny of this would-be Watchman hero. She can speak for herself, but I would have you know that Corporal Swift has sought to persecute her faith as well, under the color of official Sanctuary law.

I am certain that it was never the intent of the Council that the conspiracy law should be used as a vessel for zealous Helmite Watchmen to loose their unfounded conspiracy theories and desperate rescue fantasies upon the unwilling women of Sanctuary. The religious fervor of this Watchman's campaign of persecution risks undermining confidence in the very laws themselves, exposing the entire city to the threat of disorder.

The execution of law should be swift and merciless, but this Helmite Watchman dilutes it with his delusions of heroism and prestige. I am not a criminal, and I want these baseless charges removed from my record. But no matter what is done with me, the authorities of Sanctuary must curb Corporal Swift's recklessness before he unravels the foundation of our city's greatest strength.

Respectfully,

Mme. Ingrid Mordis The Grotto, Lavenza Estate

[received]