There are two separate claims that are being represented together; Libertas and Catpeter. Catpeter has given me permission to represent him.

FACTS:

• Catpeter was pearled by a group consisting of Clone, Malen, and Dovah in Chanadian territory. He was held for approximately 5 weeks in Xanadu before he was released. Reason given for pearling was that Catpeter sent an image link to Dovah consisting of a catpeter, which Dovah then opened.

• Jakebob and Eldoorn attempted to pearl Clone over this action, plus more - reasoning outlined here.

• In retaliation, Clone hired a mercenary group led by Ruhzzy to repeatedly attack and grief Libertas land. Ruhzzy and friends initiated the attacks and combat, attacking several people at the location without prior provocation. Aparrently and Dyanuh were pearled during this time and put into Xanadu. Dallas and ZeroRussia were pearled but released, with none of their items. Jermin8or was pearled for over a month and later released (his claims were settled separately and are already concluded).

• Libertas agreed to enter into arbitration with Clone and chose dsclouse as 3rd party arbitrator. After arbitration officially began, Clone continued to endorse Ruhzzy’s raiding and griefing at Libertas. dsclouse later resigned from this position. No arbitration has since been initiated.

ISSUES:

First, if Clone/Malen/Dovah’s initial pearling of catpeter is proven to be unjustified then their actions amount to nothing more than pearling an innocent for an arbitrary reason, then holding them for over a month. There should be a very high threshold on whether or not it is acceptable to pearl someone - by doing so you are essentially banning them from the game. Even if you ultimately conclude something like “they’re wrong but it’s not that bad”, keep in mind that presumption of innocence goes toward catpeter, who lost a month of productivity and play-time over a “gray area” when no pearling should ever take place until it’s black and white. Couple of reasons why the pearling was wrong:

1) Restriction of free speech - A player was pearled for over a month for sending nothing more than an imgur link to someone. No game rules were broken, no material damage was caused, and no intention to do harm existed. Free speech is necessary for the discussion of ideas and personal expression - Xanadu should not be the penalty for the thought crime of saying something Clone doesn’t like. There’s a precedent to be set here, and punishing someone for a completely verbal/text based crime with no in-game impact should be avoided.

2) Violation of sovereignty - Catpeter lived in viridian, a town where the more tasteless images/speech/etc are run of the mill and perfectly legal. Even if Clone was personally offended, he should have shown at least some deference in respecting a town’s explicit laws banning foreign bounty hunters. Instead, he trespassed on their territory and pearled one of their citizens without prior notice or evidence of any illegal action.

3) Failure to take proper precautions - Imagine if everyday people handed you suitcases, some strangers, some friends, and all have a warning on this ''might contain an explosive’’. Why open it unless it’s someone you trust? Minecraft has a default setting preventing you from clicking on a link unless you really want to. It’s an account named catpeter sending suspicious links. A ‘cat peter’ incident had already been widely publicized prior to this, it’s a common chanada joke, and it’s not like Dovah or Clone don’t read the subreddit. There’s a reason games are rated for offline/single player mode only - because content can’t be regulated as strictly on forums or community servers. If Dovah doesn’t want his daughter to see age-inappropriate material then he shouldn’t let her use his computer while he’s logged into civcraft, a server that frequently champions ‘no rules’.

If you end up deciding it was initially justified to pearl catpeter, the question still stands as to why it was necessary to hold him for an entire month. A month is more typical of how much a first-time offender would get for murdering a few people or breaking into some houses - not how much someone should get for sending a nasty image link. At some point, pearling people for disproportionate amounts of time should become just as criminal as their initial offense. Prisonpearl was intended to regulate and correct behavior - to make it possible for players to self-police their community. Is it really justifiable to pearl someone 8 months for not re-planting a field? If that pearl-holder refuses to release them what should the appropriate action be? That’s obviously an extreme example, but it does show that oversteps in pearling can and should be actively challenged, and this is one such instance.

Now, even if you think it was a good idea both to pearl catpeter and to vault him for a month, you have to wonder why Clone kept him an additional 3 days after Dovah asked for his release. This is a very simple principle being violated - if the victim of a crime drops their charges then you cannot take it into your own hands. If MtFlushmore pearls me for fun and we’re all joking around about it, it would be absurd for some lone bounty hunter to come and vault him for assault/pearling. The instant Dovah called for catpeter’s release it should have happened. For all intents and purposes, from that point onwards catpeter was an innocent sitting in Clone’s vault because he had offended him. Dovah asked for him to be released December 1. Clone held him until the 4th, at which point combined public pressure, bounties, and Shaded/Venk finally forced him to give out.

Given these three points (catpeter shouldn’t have been pearled to begin with, if he should then the pearling was too long, if the pearling wasn’t too long then he should’ve been released upon Dovah’s request) I think that Jakebob and Eldoorn had very good cause to go after Clone’s pearl. He showed zero intention of paying any reparations to catpeter for the time spent in the End, and showed every intention of continuing to pearl whomever he liked in the future based purely on gut feeling alone.

Some other reasons are listed here as to why we believe attacking Clone was justified. All of this together at the very least provides probable cause for an ‘arrest’ to force some kind of trial or arbitration and give Clone an incentive to try settling his claims.

After this attack, Clone and Itaqi placed bounties not only on Jakebob and Eldoorn, but also on every other member of Libertas. Being present at Libertas (at the time consisting only of a 30-ish wide hole, some chests, and a bunker) was reason enough to get pearled. A few days later, Badash, Ruhzzy, Cellsaver, Mirakill, and a few others showed up on-site and initiated a fight with TB and Jakebob before running. This continued for several days, all while we were attempting to work out arbitration and at least two attacks occurring after we had already decided on an arbitrator and both sides had started working on statements.

Ruhzzy has confirmed that Clone promised him something like a stack of diamond blocks per Libertas member pearled, which resulted in Aparrently, Dyanuh, and Jermin8or ending up in Xanadu. Ruhzzy also confirmed that Clone gave the OK to continue attacks during arbitration.

Clone (and probably Itaqi) should be held partially liable for the damages caused by Ruhzzy’s crew. They knowingly supplied them diamonds, probably potion materials/XP as well, and told them to attack Libertas. Clone straight up hired someone to kill people who were uninvolved in his initial dispute with Jakebob/Eldoorn - if that’s not deserving of reps I don’t know what is. Clone/Itaqi also provided safe harbor to them in Orion/Xanadu, despite knowing about the many, many active claims that still existed against them.

Libertas’ initial claims were documented here but we’re going to re-calculate them to match updated events since then -

• 3 sets of prot and 3 sets boot/helm (Dyanuh, Aparrently, Dallas, 1.5 set per person) = 3x120d 3x55d = 525d

• 15d/day pearled for Dyanuh and Aparrently= 30d x 53 days= 1590d

• 20d and 10 e blocks for armor repairs after multiple and frequent attacks, per person (TB, Jakebob) = 50d x 2 = 100d

• 25d for 10-15d bastion repair/labor spent = 25d

• 20d for breaking our stone and charcoal factories/various chests = 20d

• 15d for the hassle of cleaning up the stone reinforced grief = 15d

Total reps to Libertas: 2275

Clone does not owe the entirety of this. Ruhzzy’s group should be held accountable for a proportion as well, but I’ll leave it up to you to decide what. I believe Clone should be held liable for a sizable percentage of the material damage done, because he was the sole reason they were there, and be held liable for 100% of the pearling costs (the 1590d) of Aparrently and Dyanuh, because he is the owner of the vault and could have released them at any point.

Clone also needs to pay 15d per day catpeter was held, which would be 480d. I’ve heard the somewhat ridiculous argument by JDz before that he shouldn’t have to pay for this because he was simply the ‘warden’ guarding Dovah’s prisoner in good faith but come on…really? Clone held someone’s pearl for over a month, he couldn’t take the 5 minutes to figure out whether he was guilty or innocent? By that logic no one at Titan was guilty because they all thought they were defending a totally 100% legit vault…OK.

Anyways, this is already turning into a pretty big wall of text so I’ll cut it short for now but please get back to me with any arguments of theirs that you feel I’ve failed to address so I can get a chance to respond to them before you make your decision.

Thanks!