Resolution of a PC Trial

So one of my players pulled a homebrew card from the Deck of Many Things that made him wanted in 4 cities. He got arrested in one but rather than paying the fine my players decided to fight it in court.

They argued that the PC was with them at the time of the crime and that he couldn't be in multiple place at once. However, they failed to disprove the testimony of the main witness (the Archfey who created the Deck) or to plant proper doubt in his testimony in the minds of the jury & the prosecution argued that the Deck was unknown quantity and the other PCs testimony was unreliable as they were his friends. 

The trial is over and I feel like I have little leeway (based on the arguments) whether to declare the player guilty or not guilty.  I have one or two ideas about how I could resolve this. However, I'd love to hear what fun ways you all would resolve this situation. Thanks in advance.

You could have them hold a recess and then the players  use iron (in myths some fey are repelled by iron) to force it to testify saying that they didn’t do it, but technically in Dnd iron doesn’t affect fey, but it would be a neat homebrew way of dealing with it. Or the player could make a deal with the fey, giving it their name, a promise for a favor, or something fun like that. That’s a fun card for the deck of many things though

Honestly, I'd flip the question back on you. What fun resolution did you see happening when you created the homebrew?

If you didn't create it, what fun resolution did you forsee when you allowed the homebrew?

Personally, I'd never have allowed a homebrew like this myself unless I had already prepared for the multitude of outcomes possible. Thinking about the scenario in which the party get into legal trouble due to a fey, I'd simply have the fey present the 'court' with the option to have the party transported to the feywild. There's all sorts of new and fun things to explore there, and the deal could be that the archfey is willing to allow them to resume their prior lives before its interference if they complete a quest in the feywild, or flipping it on the other end the shadowfell. 


As an aside though, I would be concerned about how you ran the 'trial'. Was it all the result of persuasion and performance checks? Where you as GM running both the prosecution, NPCs, and jury/judge? It really does sound like a slippery slope that ought not have been touched on unless you were already prepared to deal with the consequences fully.

Thank you Rockyranger, those are some cool ideas. Unfortunately the trial is actually already over. I'm sorry for not making the question clear enough in the beginning - I've edited it now.

Thank you. It's one of my several Ruin alternatives because my players love to get the Deck of Many Things but they're always dodging Ruin by giving their stuff to other people & because I actually don't like Ruin - I'd rather they suffer some monetary loss rather than losing everything. 

Thank you Martintheactor.

Honestly I just thought they'd pay 5000 GP fine & get on with the game. I never thought they'd spend an entire session going to court over this, but we all had fun so alls well that ends well I guess.

That's a very interesting idea thank you very much. I will consider what I can do with that.

Yes I ran all the NPCs and we based it on the arguments presented. I left them several exploitable opportunities to have the case thrown out and made sure they were aware that there was more they could be doing before they ended their defence. 

If the trial is over, I'd say that you get to decide on their arguments. You said that you all had fun doing it, so it seems that everything went fine, as long as you all enjoyed it. You are the final arbiter in this scenario. If you gave the arguments to us and still feel uncertain, we can probably help you decide.

If you feel that the trial means Guilty, then I would suggest some sort of "leniency because you're useful" clause which means it's community service to destroy some monster or another, which ultimately serves the purposes of the Fey (because why else would they have testified to get that verdict?).

What motives has the Fey, what might they be interested in?

Regarding the prior comments around Iron, I have a material in my world called Cold Iron, which is basically what iron is to the Fey in most stories - Cold Iron doesn't allow magic to flow, so magical beings dislike it intensely and can be burnt by it. You could have them perform some fetch quest in which they remove an iron barrier which has been keeping the Fey from something, so that they can later retrieve it after the party has completed their arbitrary fetch-quest.

Assuming this was a jury trial, not a bench trial, you actually have a third option - a hung jury.  When a jury is unable to reach a unanimous decision, the judge can declare a mistrial and dismiss the matter without prejudice.  That means the defendant is not found not guilty, which would attach double jeopardy protections.  It also means there is no guilty verdict, so the prosecution cannot move onto sentencing.

This gives you some room to reward the players for their arguments, but not allow them to get off free.  The prosecution can approach the party after and offer a deal - you do this thing for us, we’ll enter an agreement to drop the charges.

If it was a bench trial with a judge, or if you want the finality of a single judgment, I would recommend a finding of not guilty, unless your party has real world lawyers in it.  

Speaking as a trial attorney, it is hard for laypeople to fully put on a legal defense - especially in a fictitious game where the DM is finder of fact and prosecution and nearly omnipotent.  If laypeople put on a pretty decent defense, the most satisfying result is the judge or jury finding the party was not guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.  Remember, the finder of fact could still be 75% sure the party did it, but if they’re not at that 90% sure-ish threshold for reasonable doubt, they are supposed to enter a finding of not-guilty.

When I play with other lawyers, I hold them to a much higher standard in court sessions.  But that is a very specific edge case that does not seem relevant here. 

Thank you very much WolfeCriedPup. There actually isn't really anything more to the arguments than what's in the 2nd paragraph of the original post.

Thank you very much ThorukDuckSlayer, that's a great idea.

I'm not sure if you mean this as a rhetorical question for me to think about but the Fey is a complete anarchist. It doesn't particularly want anything other than to cause chaos. That's why it created the Deck & why it's here testifying. It doesn't actually care if the PC is found guilty or not, it just enjoys messing with them (it's not the first time he's meddled with the PCs, sometimes helpful, sometimes trouble-causing; he's just very whimsical)

That is a really cool idea, thank you very much.

Thank you very much Caerwyn_Glyndwr. That is a really good alternative solution that I hadn't considered. I like the idea of offering some reward but still forcing to make some kind of settlement.