After securing these convictions, Saturninus then passed a law establishing a new permanent court that would deal with cases of maiestas, crimes that damaged the prestige of the state. This law took the ad hoc corruption tribunals and made them a permanent fixture of public life. Any noble who took a wrong step could now expect to find himself brought before the new court and prosecuted before a panel of Equestrian jurors on the flimsiest of pretenses. The new court would not exactly be the Revolutionary Tribunal that became such a feared tool during the French Revolution. But it was close.28
