(no subject)
It takes a day and a half, from the time Gabriel Tam brought the news, for Galadan and River to put the pieces together. (Even with their particular skills, this would be a significantly slower process without Senator Tam's many resources. They're not the only ones poring through records of Aberdeen's recent criminal activity; there are several other sets of eyes doing the grunt work of looking at all kinds of records and cross-checking details and discrepancies.)
The situation is this:
Aberdeen is a largely rural world which is nonetheless possessed of a small but significant number of people who have made fortunes through cunning and carefully legal manipulation of local laws about land tenancy, mine ownership, and tax loopholes for off-world business. Most of them live in one of the handful of small cities in the opposite hemisphere from Mary Lennox's new home -- particularly the capital city, outside of which the population is scattered, generally poor, and fiercely proud of their identity as members of each town. It's a hardscrabble world, if you're not one of the few dozen people who, one way or another, own most of Aberdeen.
Four years ago, Aberdeen's council of banks passed a number of reform measures. Among other changes, they provide a much longer window than usual for an individual to cancel a money transfer (including after the initial notification has hit the recipient's bank account); greater requirement for legal ID when transferring significant sums of money; and a great deal of scope for any individual claiming coercion on financial decisions.
In other words, exactly the kind of reforms that might be undertaken to counter a kidnap-and-extortion racket.
Shortly afterwards, the number of rich Aberdonian businessmen claiming abduction plummeted.
The number of single men and women experiencing mysteriously abrupt drops to their bank accounts, however, rose sharply.
There's a mass of data to sort through: police reports, bank records, local stories, some of it official and some of it not. But the gist is this: every year, a few people find themselves suddenly married and just as suddenly divorced, and significantly poorer for the experience. Not all of them are kidnapped in the process, but most have been. (Aberdeen has fairly stringent divorce laws, which have only been strengthened in the last few years of these proceedings. The only relevant effect seems to be that most of these whirlwind divorces take place on nearby Whittier instead.)
For some people, it's a quick process, relatively painless except for a few days' absence and the financially ruinous consequences.
For others, especially the ones who are poorer to begin with, though, the experience is often... less quick, and less painless. Sometimes much less. No less ruinous, however.
(River reads through the accounts of the latter category of victims in silence, one hand twisting absently at her side while the other scrolls and taps through the datareader's commands. Her face is still and set with a rare, cold intensity.)
It's not that Aberdeen is lawless. There are marshalls here, and sheriffs and constables, and all sorts of people who probably know exactly what's going on. The gang, whoever they are, has been canny enough to time their abductions during the arrival and departure of freight convoys or under cover of solar flares, both times when tracing a small ship is difficult, but their activities have gone on long enough for data to accumulate.
But the local authorities don't have the numbers necessary to take on a gang of determined and violent criminals with a well-defended home base. Especially if they want to have even the barest nod to rule of law, and do their best to arrest everyone they can instead of summarily killing the whole gang. And so far, no one who's been kidnapped has been high-profile enough to attract the attention of outside authorities, even with the IIGA bringing more Alliance resources to the Rim.
The situation is this:
Aberdeen is a largely rural world which is nonetheless possessed of a small but significant number of people who have made fortunes through cunning and carefully legal manipulation of local laws about land tenancy, mine ownership, and tax loopholes for off-world business. Most of them live in one of the handful of small cities in the opposite hemisphere from Mary Lennox's new home -- particularly the capital city, outside of which the population is scattered, generally poor, and fiercely proud of their identity as members of each town. It's a hardscrabble world, if you're not one of the few dozen people who, one way or another, own most of Aberdeen.
Four years ago, Aberdeen's council of banks passed a number of reform measures. Among other changes, they provide a much longer window than usual for an individual to cancel a money transfer (including after the initial notification has hit the recipient's bank account); greater requirement for legal ID when transferring significant sums of money; and a great deal of scope for any individual claiming coercion on financial decisions.
In other words, exactly the kind of reforms that might be undertaken to counter a kidnap-and-extortion racket.
Shortly afterwards, the number of rich Aberdonian businessmen claiming abduction plummeted.
The number of single men and women experiencing mysteriously abrupt drops to their bank accounts, however, rose sharply.
There's a mass of data to sort through: police reports, bank records, local stories, some of it official and some of it not. But the gist is this: every year, a few people find themselves suddenly married and just as suddenly divorced, and significantly poorer for the experience. Not all of them are kidnapped in the process, but most have been. (Aberdeen has fairly stringent divorce laws, which have only been strengthened in the last few years of these proceedings. The only relevant effect seems to be that most of these whirlwind divorces take place on nearby Whittier instead.)
For some people, it's a quick process, relatively painless except for a few days' absence and the financially ruinous consequences.
For others, especially the ones who are poorer to begin with, though, the experience is often... less quick, and less painless. Sometimes much less. No less ruinous, however.
(River reads through the accounts of the latter category of victims in silence, one hand twisting absently at her side while the other scrolls and taps through the datareader's commands. Her face is still and set with a rare, cold intensity.)
It's not that Aberdeen is lawless. There are marshalls here, and sheriffs and constables, and all sorts of people who probably know exactly what's going on. The gang, whoever they are, has been canny enough to time their abductions during the arrival and departure of freight convoys or under cover of solar flares, both times when tracing a small ship is difficult, but their activities have gone on long enough for data to accumulate.
But the local authorities don't have the numbers necessary to take on a gang of determined and violent criminals with a well-defended home base. Especially if they want to have even the barest nod to rule of law, and do their best to arrest everyone they can instead of summarily killing the whole gang. And so far, no one who's been kidnapped has been high-profile enough to attract the attention of outside authorities, even with the IIGA bringing more Alliance resources to the Rim.