DOTLAN EveMaps

"To be just, our law must be cruel."

Throughout the millions of worlds of the Imperium, crime is rife. Not just the petty crimes of individuals for personal gain, but organised crime on a scale never even considered in humanity's past. Entire sub-sectors and planets have been in the thrall of illegal cartels and criminal organisations.

The Adeptus Arbites is the Imperial Adepta that serves as the galactic police force of the Imperium of Man, responsible for enforcing Imperial Law (the Lex Imperialis) on all Imperial-controlled worlds. They have been granted the right by the High Lords of Terra to serve as judge, jury and executioner to any Imperial citizen they discover having broken the Imperial law.

The Lex Imperialis, the code of Imperial law, is written down in the Book of Judgement kept by the Adeptus Arbites. The Book of Judgement has been painstakingly collected, annotated and collated over millennia and embodies every decree ever passed by the Emperor Himself or the High Lords of Terra. In fact, the Book of Judgement has long-since grown beyond the confines of a single tome, no matter how large, and comprises countless records, books, and legal decrees.

The Adeptus Arbites are the chief enforcers of the Emperor's law. On the countless worlds of the Imperium, it is the steel gauntlet of the Arbites that ensures the inviolable law of the Emperor is followed. It is the Arbitrators who stand ready to enforce the law of the Imperium over the regulations and concerns of planetary rulers, and it is the Arbitrators who are the first line of defence against rebellion and anarchy. They are the rigid, unbreakable order of the Imperium personified.

The Judges of the Adeptus Arbites are mighty lords, clad in the raiment and traditions of a long past age. They wield the absolute and unforgiving law of the Imperium with brutal and unyielding exaction, for it is given to them to stand guard against the treachery of those beneath them and the excesses and ambitions of those in power. Not least of all this includes the Lords Commander and their agents who directly govern the Imperium's many worlds.

Arbitrators whose particular skills lie in the application of extreme brutality and military force or the command of men in battle, and who have proven time and again that they are nigh impossible to kill, may be promoted to the level of Proctor or Marshal.

Thought of the day
Claims of innocence mean nothing; they serve only to prove a foolish lack of caution.
-Selected Sayings, Vol. III, Chapter IV