#sherstrade

In a criminal investigation, suicide can be interpreted as a confession or as an acknowledgment of guilt. That's why Moriarty wanted Sherlock to do it. Sherlock was being investigated for having perpetrated the crimes he solved and then solving them to fraudulently take the credit.

As we see in ASIB, Lestrade is the one who convinced other detectives to use Sherlock, and he uses him the most often (to the point that in TBB, Sherlock is unpleasantly surprised Lestrade isn't there). So if Moriarty's allegations were true, either Lestrade is a terrible detective who did not notice he was being taken for a ride, or else he was an accomplice and also enjoying the fraudulent rewards. If Sherlock is a fraud, Lestrade is a fraud. By faking his death, Sherlock as good as confessed. If John told anyone about that stupid phone call, he straight up confessed.

Lestrade could have lost his badge. Lestrade could have gone to prison.

Secondly, the Chief Superintendent did not know that Lestrade and the other detectives were using Sherlock despite Sherlock's established fame. That means that Sherlock's assistance was either "eyes no hands" -- Lestrade presenting Sherlock's conclusions as his own work, probably more true prior to the blog since afterward it was impossible -- or else Lestrade and John were making it look like Sherlock was stumbling into police investigations while doing unrelated private detective work. (That puts Lestrade on the knife edge of perjury, which again, had now come to light and Sherlock wasn't there to help clean up the mess. At the very least, Lestrade failed to disclose information to the prosecutor and to the defense.)

What all that means, is that Lestrade got the Met into this Sherlock-is-a-fraud mess without running it by Legal, without giving the Met an opportunity to decline, or even letting them know Lestrade was taking the risk and increased liability.

Sherlock's confession to being a fraud would put every case he'd ever worked on under suspicion. They'd all have to be re-tried, and potentially re-tried with any evidence Sherlock was responsible for excluded. Lestrade, the Crown, and the Met would have had to defend every case they'd worked together in addition to proving that Moriarty actually was the villain and all this was fake.

And again -- Lestrade got the Crown and the Met into this mess without permission from his superiors. The other detectives could also have thrown Lestrade under the bus as the senior DI who urged them to use Sherlock's help. We don't know.

I cannot emphasize enough how fired Lestrade would have been in reality-land. (Since he was not, we may infer that he is canonically capable of talking his way out of literally anything.)

And Sherlock wasn't there to help for any of it. He confessed and fucked off for two years. Lestrade had to keep himself out of jail and from being fired and keep everyone they'd put away in prison alone (in the sense of their partnership).

Sherlock didn't ask before leaving Lestrade holding the bag. He didn't even do Lestrade the courtesy of the phone call John got. He just hauled off and did it.

Lestrade had infinitely more reason to be angry and suffered objectively more harm by the way Sherlock handled Moriarty.

Yet, Lestrade presumes that Sherlock wouldn't have done that to him if he could have avoided it. He is just happy Sherlock isn't actually dead.

John does not and is not.

I do not buy that John was sufficiently provoked to make his violence justified or in any way "to be expected." And if the show was trying to show us that John is Sherlock's soulmate, that was a piss-poor way to do it.

It is also worth noting, because fuck Season 3 & 4 John forever, that the first time we see Lestrade hug Sherlock is when he's back from the dead.

The first time we see John hug Sherlock? Is after Sherlock delivered a self-deprecating speech that was entirely complimentary to John.