I was just wondering has anyone else realised that if the Ministry of Magic didn't believe Harry about Voldemort returning to power in the fifth book, could they not have just given him a few drops of veritaserum to see if he was telling the truth or not? It would have solved a few problems. Now that i've seen this i've started to realise other things - why couldn't they use veritaserum to prove that Sirius was innocent and Wormtail was guilty? Just give Sirius a few drops of Veritaserum and ask him if he murdered all those people - he has to tell the truth. Why couldn't they use veritaserum to find out which of the Death Eater's had truly been working under the influence of the Imperius curse? Just give the people under investigation a few drops of veritaserum and ask them if they had been working of their own accord - they have to tell the truth. To quote what Snape said in the fourth movie (I say movie because i'm not sure if he says it in the book aswell): "A few drops of this and the Dark Lord himself would reveal his deepest secrets". Looking at this we can assume that no-one could potentially resist the influences of veritaserum, seeing as the Dark Lord apparently couldn't. Be interested to hear your thoughts.

First off, the ministry did use veritaserum on harry, umbridge tries to give it to harry when she is questioning him. I am fairly sure that the way in which you recieve the veritaserum is important. Such as; if snape slipped veritaserum into harrys drink without him knowing than he would start spewing all of his secrets. However, if someone sat you down and said 'we are giving you veritaserum, now tell us all of your secrets' you would be able to control yourself. So, if the ministry used veritaserum to solve crimes and find guilt or innocence the people on trial would know that they are receiving it and it would not have as much of an effect on them. It's the same case with Harry, if he would have drunk veritaserum he may have been able to fight off the desire to tell the truth. Its the same reason they dont just use legilimency on criminals because a skilled occlumens could block the images or even change them to show that they were innocent when they actually weren't

This can't be right though. I was re-reading the sixth book and I came across this:

This shows that the Ministry does actually use Veritaserum to try and pry the information out of criminals. They wouldn't do that if it was resistable. So clearly Veritaserum isn't something resistable even if you know your taking it. Be interested to hear what you think.

I don't think the Ministry wanted people to know that all along they were wrong. Like they typically are in their selfish behavior, they give everyone the image "Oh everything's okay, not to worry, we are actually the boss here, don't worry about Voldemort, blah blah blah." Sure, the Ministry might believe him, they might not. They want witches and wizards alike to think, "Oh, we're safe," and they don't want them freaking out, they want their 'citizens' to think they have everything under control. If Harry starts saying things that everyone knows is true because Veristaserum doesn't fail, there would be freaking out. Also, maybe the Ministry (or just Fudge) doesn't want to admit the facts themselves? I don't think it's a question of ability, just the fact that the Ministry wants to put out a positive message and don't want to admit that "Oh no, Voldemort's back! Looks like the little bugger was right....". You know what I mean? Now I'm not sure why they didn't just use their block-headed wits to use it on potential Death Eaters. Just goes out to priove that the Ministry (along with a few people in our governmental status) are dolts.

If the Ministry of Magic used veritaserum then they would have acknowleged a possibility that Voldemort could have a way to return. Fudge and the ministry never wanted to admit there was a chance. If they did use and it got out the ministry and the wizarding world would have gone into a panic, since the ministry was lying to them for a little while and they then used the potion they would freak and then turn on fudge and he would be out of a job. And that is what Fudge was most afraid of.

Good questiooon~♥

Perhaps they do not use Veritaserum on suspects for the same reason our law inforcement do not always use polygraphs, it is not always 100% accurate.

For example, in our world, police may not use a polygraph because if it shows that the suspect is guilty, the jury (and others involved in prosecution) could become biased by the results, even though they may not be accurate. So they simply do not use them all that often.

Could it be similar with Veritaserum? Perhaps the accuracy is lowered when a suspects suspects that they will be slipped Veritaserum?

Just a thought

Perhaps the accuracy theory may be correct, siriuslyinlove, it does sound possible. I mean, magic isn't always 100% perfect right? And I'm assuming that Veritaserum is a very complex potion, so the tiniest mistake could cost a lot. Maybe the potion would backfire and cause direct opposite results, making the person say the opposite of the truth, then if the person really is guilty, they might have just thrown away an innocent person.

I think this one was because they were absolutely sure that he was guilty. They didn't even give him a trial, did they? They had witnesses . . . they had a pinky finger . . . as far as they knew, Wormtail was dead. They didn't see the need for veritaserum when the evidence was so damning.

I'm not sure how this one would work. I wonder, though, if it has something to do with what Dumbledore tells us about Veritaserum in HBP when Harry asks him why he didn't use Legilimency or Veritaserum on Slughorn to collect the important memory: "Professor Slughorn is an extremely able wizard who will be expecting both [. . .]I woud be astonished if he has not carried an antidote to Veritaserum with him ever since I coerced him into giving me this travesty of a recollection." This shows that if they were expecting Veritaserum to be used on them, they could certainly have an antidote to the potion available. I think the reason it worked on Barty Crouch Jr. was because he was caught by surprise and was very unprepared for it. He was so involved in needing the Polyjuice potion every hour or so, perhaps the need for an antidote for Veritaserum eluded him.

This is a book/movie difference. Snape says that one drop of it would have Harry spilling his innermost secrets to the entire class, but he doesn't mention Voldemort at all. (GoF, 27)

In that little section, Snape also says that Veritaserum is under strict ministry guidelines... This might support some of what the others ahead of me in here have discussed: Perhaps they simply aren't allowed to use Veritaserum for every crime.

I don't know. It would seem rather a convenient way to go about getting the truth out of people.

I don't agree with this, though. It's not like Legilimency when a person CAN be prepared to mentally fight an intrusion. The potion works as the potion works, regardless of ability. It did not seem that Snape or Umbridge thought that Harry knowing he was about to receive Veritaserum would have helped him avoid the effects of the potion at all. It wouldn't have mattered if Harry had prepared his mind for the potion because, as Snape repeats that "three drops" is all she had needed to interrogate the student. Evidently, she used more. Then he goes on to mention poisons that act so quickly that it doesn't leave the victim much time for truth-telling... Either way, I think the only counter to this potion is the antidote, and so the preparedness of the person about to receive the Veritaserum would only matter if they happened to have that on their person and could act quickly enough to take it after being administered the Veritaserum.

I would have to believe that if someone were a compulsive liar, then the use of Veritaserum would be moot. If we take the Muggle versions of "truth serum", sodium pentathol or a lie detector, both can be tricked by someone who has so totally convinced themselves of a lie. Even the "travesty of a memory" that Dumbledore retrieves from Slughorn. It effectively hides the truth, albeit poorly. But it does suggest that someone more skilled or prepared might have been more skillful.

Also, what if someone truly believes they are telling the truth? For instance, when Harry gave Ron what he thought was a "lucky potion", he so firmly believed it he played better. Ron would have sworn Harry gave it to him (even without the Veritaserum). But Ron's truth is a lie - it didn't happen. So imagine someone on whom the Imperious Curse is used a few times. Maybe they liked the feeling of doing things they always wanted to do but laws, customs, social standing, decency, whatever, prevented them. If they continued to do those things, they could always convince themselves they were still under the Imperious Curse, and then Veritaserum would be of no help.

I don't think that's the case. With lie detectors and such, it measures the human reactions to telling a lie vs. telling the truth. With sodium thiopental, which is a mild anesthetic used in small doses during interrogation, it does not "force" anyone to tell the truth, but is used to weaken the resolve. Perhaps effective, but not quite the same thing. Though we don't have a very detailed account of just exactly how Veritaserum works, being that it is a magical potion, I believe that is forces the user to tell the truth - no matter how good a liar. It does not merely weaken their resolve.

This doesn't really suggest that someone more skilled can alter the truth using Veritaserum, though. It suggests that someone can be prepared to alter other's perceptions of the truth. The only reason Slughorn was not given Veritaserum by Dumbledore is because, as Dumbledore said, Slughorn would no doubt be carrying around the antidote to Veritaserum, being prepared to alter it's effect on him by another magical potion - not by any other action he could have performed.


I do agree with this. If someone believes with all their heart that they are telling the truth - it is their truth- then Veritaserum wouldn't be effective on them. Ron would have said that he had been given a dose of Felix Felicis up until the moment he was told otherwise.

I'm undecided about whether it would work on a compulsive liar who has convinced themselves that their lie has become the truth. It seems like it would be the same thing as above, yet I'm not convinced. The lie started somewhere within that person, so inside them is the truth... I tend to think that the most powerful truth serum would be able to uncover it.

If the person started acting outside of the realms of the Imerius Curse, I think they would know. Again, the truth is within them, so if the questions were worded correctly under the influence of Veritasuerm, I think it would come out.

Obviously, a lot isn't known about Veritaserum, so I'm only basing what I think about it on the books and what the characters have said and how characters have responded to the potion. Umbridge apparently thought that using more than 3 drops would give her a better chance at getting the truth out of the students when she was interrogating them, but Snape insists that 3 drops is all that is needed. Perhaps dosage does matter, but it seems to me that the truth will out, even under the minimum dosage.