Here's how borked the new Crime and Punishment system is.

I would like to share with everyone my experience with the new crime and punishment system. I know that everyone is aware that it's gone over the top and perhaps borderline draconian when it comes to stray laser discipline in even the most frantic Haz res sites, but I wasn't aware it was this bipolar.

A few days ago, I was attempting to complete a naval rank mission in my decidedly mediocre Python. I had to kill an AI Python with rails and he wrecked me. Being a bit prideful, I went straight back in and as soon as I saw him a second time, I opened fire. You probably already know what I did wrong here but in case you don't, I opened fire before confirming the "wanted" tag on my target, incurring a 200cr fine. Again being a prideful dumbass, I thought I was getting an edge on him but he still blew me out of the sky, this time with a fine equating to your average lowly speeding ticket resulting in my being sent 250 Ly away to a detention facility.

Now, at this point I should clarify: up to here, I realize what I did wrong. I charged in head-first, I didn't let the scan complete, etc. I get it. I don't really agree with the system sending me away, but if I'm honest it didn't really inconvenience me all that much and I soon let it slide.

That was, until I went hunting in a Haz res site in my Courier that next night (because those Python rebuys were starting to strain my bank account)

That night, I was doing the usual hunting activity of sitting in a site, scanning everything that moved and, if it had a wanted tag, opening fire with everything I had. Everything was going fine until I (along with a few system security vessels) was attacking some wanted Clipper. Evidently one of the sys sec ships was badly damaged but still right on the ass of the Clipper because before I knew it, I had a 5000cr fine for murder. I didn't stop to think. Full power to the engines, remaining pips to shield, we're bugging out.

After a bit of searching the galaxy map, I find somewhere to pay the fine to discover I can't pay it off because I now have a point Notoriety. Great. I go to google and look up how to remove it. "2 hours of play time or if the security vehicles who are pursuing you manage to kill you." The second part of this statement would turn out to be false. If I went to patch notes instead of forum posts, I'd have known this but that's not my point here.

The results of being killed with a fine vs being killed while notorious is my biggest beef with this current system.

I was wanted in my home port of Shajin Market. I thought "This will be easy, I'll go there and they'll kill me. Fine gone." So I flew to Shajin. I loitered outside the mailslot. I even got scanned a half dozen times. Nothing happened. I thought "Maybe if I fly inside the station and it kills me, it'll clear my fine." I flew inside, it killed me, I still had the fine and notoriety. I was also sent to the normal rebuy screen as if my status was completely normal. No jail, nothing.

Next I thought maybe if I flew back to the very Haz res where I gained the notoriety and let someone kill me I would have it cleared. Nope. I got killed, but I wasn't even glanced at by a single Shield of Justice vessel and I got to keep all my bounty and notoriety, and still had a standard rebuy screen.

So to summarize this tremendous word wall: I don't know what this crime and punishment system is and evidently the sole method of removing notoriety is time, being killed by sys sec vessels does fuck all to clear it but hey, at least you're not going to jail. BUT: may God have mercy on your soul if you tap the trigger on a terrorist bastard before being 110% sure what color his underwear are because space jail is reserved for pretty criminals. I guess space prison hasn't been built yet.

The new Crime and Punishment system is beyond fucked. Fly safe Commanders.

Edit: a lot of people are pointing out that I could have just gone to another system and ignored it, or that the patch notes would have properly informed me that dying would not clear it. I concede that these are valid points. I guess my main point here is my shock that in this new system, dying with a minor fine means being shipped off to jail, while dying with a bounty on your head and notoriety means... nothing evidently. Moral of the story seems to be: If you accidentally tag a space cop with a stray shot, make sure to hunt him down and finish him off because then you won't be sent to jail if you die.

Edit 2: added a good bit of next day clarification.