The February Consortium

The February Consortium: A criminal conspiracy involving companies of the Mining Alliance and rogue financiers.

Members:
Fallon Mining

Kremmen Metals

Kaur Mining Corporation

Lorca Deep Space Resources

Truman Interstellar Finance

Phoenix Finance

Holbrook Asteroid Harvesting (out of business)

Individuals
Arthur Carmody

Janice Kaur

Jackson Jones

Morris Appleby

Bernard Dietrich

"Dexterity"

Aims and actions
Show/Hide Spoilers for Threat Session The February Consortium's ultimate aim was the invasion of the incredibly wealthy mining world, Tiovo. Planetary invasions are considered the highest crime, a Stipulation 1 violation of the security protocols of the Focus Protectorate - the very crime the Protectorate, and Black Fleet, were founded to eliminate. The punishment for knowingly participating in a planetary invasion were the harshest in the Protectorate, who had banned capital punishment for all crimes bar this.

While planetary invasions are the highest crime, the Consortium gambled that as Tiovo was not a planetary colony with any legal identity as such - being affiliated with neither the PPB, nor having a planetary governor in the Protectorate CoG (Chamber of Governors) - they could legally challenge the definition of their actions as an invasion, and frame it as a business takeover. As Tiovo's solar twin world, and the first colony in the system, Kaur, had never actually granted Tiovo independence, their legal status was genuinely shakey.

Believing Sovereign Dofstez had neither the power nor the will to root out an embedded enemy in a bloody conflict (such actions themselves being open to being classed as a planetary invasion) they proceeded with their plans, drawn up on February 1st, Year 279.

The Consortium began a series of pirate attacks on Mining Alliance convoys, gradually escalating in severity and size. By destabilising the Mining Alliance, Arthur Carmody intended to push the bloc into handing control of their disparate fighting vessels over to him, which he could then position around the Protectorate far from Tiovo, and leave his forces clear to invade.

Unfortunately for Carmody and the Consortium, the Sovereign had tasked reporter Linc Bostrom with investigating the mining convoy attacks, who had unravelled the mystery just in time for the Sovereign to act. The lawyers who Carmody had dispatched to tie the Sovereign's hands in legal actions were arrested on the steps of the Supreme Court on Focus. The Sovereign called a Threat Session with the CoG Select Board and having presented his evidence of a violation of Stipulations 1, 2 and 3, was granted emergency powers to act however he saw fit in ending the threat of the February Consortium. The Security Protocols of the Protectorate even forbade interference from the PPB.

Carmody's fleet was annihilated in mere minutes, with the Sovereign's own craft suffering no visible damage. This was the first time the new Sentinel Class craft had been seen in action, with the Sovereign's personal craft, Black Sentinel demonstrating what an intimidating and capable battleship it was, and not the empty, oversized and underarmed decoy some suspected the Sentinel Class craft of being.

With the assistance of the Police and their new Prowlers the ground forces were also eliminated in short order, with no further opportunity to surrender offered after the first was rejected.

The fate of the members of the Consortium is unknown, with Carmody believed killed in the ground assault, their were reports of a Black Fleet troop carrier arriving in, and leaving the capital of Tiovo, with, some believe, the living or dead body of Arthur Carmody aboard.

If he received the sentence laid out for Stipulation 1 criminals, he will have suffered a great deal before his death, but his status is unknown.