Barty Crouch Sr.

Bartemius Crouch Sr. was a strict ministry official, known for sentencing his own son to Azkaban.

Barty Crouch Sr. was famous for aggressively prosecuting Dark Wizards in the days of Voldemort’s rise to power. His fervor led him to authorize methods almost as bad as those of the Death Eaters they were hunting; he allowed the Aurors to use the Unforgivable Curses, and imprisoned people like Sirius Black in Azkaban without a trial.

Crouch was much admired at the time, but fell from grace around 1982 after he sentenced his own son to Azkaban for being a Death Eater who took part in the torture of the Longbottoms. Instead of being made the next Minister of Magic, Crouch was moved out of the public eye to the Department of International Magical Cooperation where his prodigious language skills came in handy (GF7). Percy Weasley, whom Crouch mistakenly calls “Weatherby,” became his assistant in 1994.

Crouch had a dreadful secret: as a favor to his dying wife, he had smuggled his son out of Azkaban, but then had to subdue and hide him from then on.  Eventually, Barty Crouch, Jr. was freed by Voldemort and Barty Sr. was made captive. He later escaped and tried to warn Dumbledore of a plot to get to Harry, but his son caught and killed him (June, 1995).