crookery

crookery (countable and uncountable, plural crookeries)

It was always intriguing to hear about some new form of crookery or deception.

But this is small time crookery to the real manipulators and deceivers.

2003, Martin Howell, Predators and profits: 100+ ways for investors to protect their nest eggs:

What the people never knew at the time was the scale and audacity of the crookeries of Harding's advisers. In 1923 the Senate investigated 'irregularities' in the Veterans' Bureau. It had been defrauded of tidy sums by its chief […]

2008, Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke's America:


bastille

French Revolution
Poor Law Amendment Act 1834
William Cobbett
William IV
storming of the Bastille

The noun is derived from Middle English bastile, bastel (“fortification for attack mounted on a barge or wheels; projecting part of a fortification, bastion, turret; fortified encampment of a besieging army; structure carrying armed men on an elephant’s back; (figuratively) refuge, shelter; protector”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman bastile, bastille, Middle French bastille, and Old French baastel, basstel (“fortification; fortified tower; temporary fortification constructed for attack or defence; (small) castle or fortress”) (modern French bastille; compare Medieval Latin bastīle), from bastide (“fortification; fortress”) with the ending modified after nouns ending in -ille (from Latin -īle (suffix forming place names)). Bastide is derived from Old Occitan bastida (“fortification; (Provence) country mansion”), from bastir (“to build, construct”) + -ida (suffix forming nouns); while bastir is from *bastīre, from Frankish *bastijan (“to sew; to weave”), from Proto-West Germanic *bast (“fibre; rope”), from Proto-Germanic *bastaz (“fibre; rope”); further etymology uncertain, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *bʰask- ~ *bʰasḱ- (“bundle, heap, load”) but this is disputed.
Sense 2.1 (“jail or prison, especially one regarded as mistreating its prisoners”) is from the Bastille in Paris, France. Known in full as the Bastille Saint-Antoine, it was a former fortress used as a prison by the French monarchy in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Bastille was stormed by a crowd on 14 July 1789 at the start of the French Revolution and later demolished, becoming an important symbol for the French Republican movement.
Sense 2.2 (“workhouse”) was possibly popularized by the English politician William Cobbett (1763–1835) who opposed the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834 (4 & 5 William IV, chapter 76; often called the “New Poor Law”). This Act made relief or welfare for poor people only available through workhouses, and ensured that the working conditions were harsh so that only the truly destitute would apply for relief.
The verb is derived from the noun.
(Cognates):
Late Latin bastile (“wooden siege tower”), bastilla, bastillia, bastillus, bastellum (“fortification; wooden siege tower”)

nb...

bastayle, bastele, bastell, bastelle, bastil, bastill, bastyle, bastyll, bastylle, (Northern England) baistell,

nb...

Commencing with the Accession of William IV.

J. Booker; Longman, Rees, Orme, and Co.; J. M. Richardson; Parbury, Allen, and Co.; J. Hatchard and Son; J. Ridgway; E. Jeffery and Son; J. Rodwell; Calkin and Budd; R. H. Evans; J. Booth; and T. C. Hansard.

col

Cognates

(British, derogatory) Synonym of workhouse (“an institution for homeless poor people funded by the local parish, where the able-bodied were required to work”)


countrymade

(in India) Describing a weapon manufactured illegally in a cottage industry


hot check

From sense hot (“illegal, stolen”) – compare hot property (“stolen goods”).

And you don’t go writing hot checks down in Mississippi,

1978, Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, “There Ain’t No Good Chain Gang”, in I Would Like to See You Again, Columbia Records:

(US, Texas) A check with non-sufficient funds (not enough money in the bank to back it up), written fraudulently.

bad check

check with insufficient funds, written fraudulently


lathi

en-noun

lathi (countable and uncountable, plural lathis)

Lathi shares its basic principles with other martial arts.

(uncountable) A martial art based on stick fighting originally practiced in India.


executioneress

Twelve umbrellas, covering as many Bo-fetiche priestesses, followed by two brass shields, a large drum, two large scimitar-shaped blades, fretted as usual, and having skulls on the hilts, eighteen Bo Kpo in red avo, six executioneresses in leopard cloths of yellow with black spots, silver horns and bracelets; a number of black affairs like Highlanders’ targets, and five flags.

1874, J. A[lfred] Skertchly, “The So-Sin Custom—(continued)”, in Dahomey as It Is: Being a Narrative of Eight Months’ Residence in That Country, […], London: Chapman and Hall, […], page 267:


pilfery

pilfery (countable and uncountable, plural pilferies)


sick call

(US, military) A daily lineup of military personnel requiring medical attention.


bandulu

bandulu (countable and uncountable, plural bandulus)

(Caribbean, Jamaica) Crime; something illicit; a scam.


e-crime

e-crime (countable and uncountable, plural e-crimes)

When asked what e-crimes were committed against their organizations in 2004, respondents cited virus or other malicious code as most prevalent (82%)...

2007, Jay D. White, Managing information in the public sector:

The National Hi Tech Computer Crime Unit was established as a specialist e-crime unit and was folded into the Serious and Organised Crime Agency in 2006.

2009, Lord Carter, Digital Britain: final report:


antipaedophile

en-adj

antipaedophile (comparative more antipaedophile, superlative most antipaedophile)

more antipaedophile (comparative)
most antipaedophile (superlative)

For example, a voice accusing a man of being a paedophile might be based on recent TV news programmes about antipaedophile vigilante groups, plus the memory of having been accused of being a pervert by a neighbour, plus fears that he might be a secret paedophile because he enjoyed reading Lolita.

2005, Hazel E. Nelson, Cognitive-behavioural therapy with delusions and hallucinations, page 217:


siblicide

en-noun

siblicide (countable and uncountable, plural siblicides)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-siblicide.wav

From sibli(ng) + -cide (suffix meaning ‘killing; killer’).

suffix

I continue to question the interpretation of "fatal sibling aggression" and active brood reduction as a means of maximizing productivity[…]. To me, the data clearly indicate a simple response to food availability, with the oldest young passively out-competing its smaller sibling for a limited resource. I still have not seen data to support "siblicide" as a strategy.

1981 winter, Ralph W. Schreiber, “Book Review: The Eastern Bering Sea Shelf: Oceanography and Resources, 1981. Edited by D. W. Hood and J. A. Calder. 2 Volumes. 1339 pp. Available from the University of Washington Press, Seattle, WA 98105. $65.00/volume.”, in Pacific Seabird Group Bulletin, volume 8, number 2, Stinson Beach, Calif.: Pacific Seabird Group, →OCLC, page 111:

Oophagy and adelphophagy, which are forms of embryonic cannibalism, occur in both cartilaginous and bony fishes. They are variations on the tactic of siblicide (Mock, 1984) as a reproductive strategy. In oophagy, embryos feed upon sibling eggs. […] Adelphophagy, literally eating one's brother, is also known in sharks as intrauterine embryonic cannibalism[…].

1988, John P. Wourms, Bryon D. Grove, Julian Lombardi, “The Maternal–Embryonic Relationship in Viviparous Fishes”, in W. S. Hoar, D. J. Randall, editors, Fish Physiology, volumes XI (The Physiology of Developing Fish), part B (Viviparity and Posthatching Juveniles), San Diego, Calif.: Academic Press, →ISBN, page 43:

Obligate siblicide is best known in various eagles, boobies, and pelicans. All lay two eggs, hatching is asynchronus, and usually the elder sib kills its younger sib soon after hatch. From the parent's perspective, the second egg/chick serves as insurance against the unexpected failure of the first[…]. Interestingly, obligate siblicide seems to be independent of prevailing food at the time of the junior sibling[']s demise.

1994, L. Scott Forbes, Douglas W. Mock, “Proximate and Ultimate Determinants of Avian Brood Reduction”, in Stefano Parmigiani, Frederick S. vom Saal, editors, Infanticide and Parental Care […] (Ettore Majorana International Life Sciences Series; 13), Chur, Switzerland, Camberwell, Victoria: Harwood Academic Publishers, →ISBN, page 245:

If siblicides are victim-based, a mother clearly cannot improve her fitness by producing fewer eggs. Less obviously, mothers may eventually be able to gain by laying more, until eventually they are constrained by the costs of eggs.

1997, Douglas W. Mock, Geoffrey A[lan] Parker, The Evolution of Sibling Rivalry (Oxford Series in Ecology and Evolution), Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 230:

One of the more recent examinations of siblicide cases is [John M.] Dawson and [Patrick A.] Langan's Special Report on Murder in Families, published through the Bureau of Justice Statistics (1994). […] According to their findings, 85% of siblicide offenders and 73% of siblicide victims were male. […] Alcohol was reported to play a role in approximately one half of the siblicides in Dawson and Langan's study.

2003, Rocky Underwood, “Family Homicide”, in edited by Eric Hickey, Encyclopedia of Murder & Violent Crime, Thousand Oaks, Calif., London: SAGE Publications, →ISBN, page 167, column 2:

Infanticide, siblicide, cannibalism, rape, and lethal combat have been documented in many kinds of animals.

2011, Steven Pinker, “The Pacification Process”, in The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence has Declined, New York, N.Y.: Penguin Books, published 2012, →ISBN, page 39:

(chiefly zoology) The killing of a sibling, especially as observed among certain species of animals.


wardress

The door opened and the wardress came in.

1993, Pat Barker, The Eye in the Door (The Regeneration Trilogy), Penguin, published 2014, page 369:


po-po

→ Dutch: popo

Green's Dictionary of Slang
Police officer

From various words by shortening and reduplication.
The "posterior" sense may be reduplication of the initial syllable of that word, with modification of the vowel according to its spelling. Compare German Popo (“bottom”) from Latin pōdex (“anus”).
The "police" sense may come from either the initial syllable of police or the initial letters of the words police officer. Compare PO.

(by extension) A prison officer, corrections officer, prison guard.


speed trap

A section of a roadway where speeds of vehicles are monitored by authorities.


targeted killing

en-noun

targeted killing (countable and uncountable, plural targeted killings)

The moral legitimacy of targeted killing becomes even clearer when compared to the alternative means of fighting terror – that is, the massive invasion of the community that shelters and supports the terrorists in an attempt to catch or kill the terrorists and destory their infrastructure.

2005, Timothy Shanahan, Philosophy 9/11: Thinking About the War on Terrorism, Open Court Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 191:

Even if the targeted killing is deemed to fall within the laws of armed conflict, the rules relating thereto protect non-combatants. While civilians cannot be targeted, if they are killed or injured during an attack on a military target, then as long as the means employed were discriminate and proportionate, there is no violation of the laws of armed conflict.

2006, Geoff Gilbert, Responding to International Crime, BRILL, →ISBN, page 307:

In wartime, however, the prohibition against targeted killing is more elusive because the law stipulates that combatants, regardless of their rank or official role, are potential targets. Since war is a contest between states, not persons, the killing in war is not murder.

2008, Mark R. Amstutz, International Ethics: Concepts, Theories, and Cases in Global Politics, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc, →ISBN, page 147:

The real issue – one emphasized in informal conversations – seems to be that unless the target is a duly designated "combatant," the targeted killing would become an "assassination."

2009, Benjamin Wittes, Legislating the War on Terror: An Agenda for Reform, Brookings Institution Press, →ISBN, page 366:

There is no announced U.S. policy directive regarding targeted killing. Assassination is addressed in Executive Order 12333, which does not prohibit killing absolutely, but only without presidential approval. Assassination and targeted killing are very different acts, however.

2010, Gary D. Solis, The Law of Armed Conflict: International Humanitarian Law in War, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 542:

In his submission to the UN, [Christof] Heyns points to the experience of drones. Unmanned aerial vehicles were intended initially only for surveillance, and their use for offensive purposes was prohibited, yet once strategists realised their perceived advantages as a means of carrying out targeted killings, all objections were swept out of the way.

2013 June 7, Ed Pilkington, “‘Killer robots’ should be banned in advance, UN told”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 6:

(warfare, euphemistic) The intentional killing by a government or its agents of a civilian or "unlawful combatant" who is not in that government's custody, and who is taking part in an armed conflict or terrorism, whether by bearing arms or otherwise, and is thus regarded by the government as having lost the immunity from being targeted that he or she would otherwise have under the Geneva Conventions.


correctional facility

correctional facility (plural correctional facilities)

For inmates in the state's correctional facilities, a typical breakfast menu consists of cereal, toast, jam, jelly, doughnuts, coffee and fruit.

1982 December 19, Donovan Wilson, “Prison Food: Not Fancy, But—”, in New York Times, archived from the original on 2020-12-21:

On Oct. 19, the Standish city council voted to allow federal prisoners, including detainees from Gitmo, to be housed at the local correctional facility.

2009 October 22, Steven Gray, “Michigan: Send Us Your Prison Inmates”, in Time, archived from the original on 2019-08-08:

(chiefly US, formal, euphemistic) A prison, reformatory, or similar institution in which people are confined for the purpose of punishment and/or social rehabilitation.


consent search

consent search (plural consent searches)

A warrantless search made by United States law enforcement personnel with the consent of the individual whose person or property is being searched.


work release

work release (countable and uncountable, plural work releases)

A program permitting a prisoner a leave of absence from prison to undertake normal employment.


hatchman

A prison guard charged with checking on the prisoner by looking through the hatch.


9-1-1
Federal Communication Commission
National Emergency Number Association
United States

The official form of the service's name in regulations and materials from the United States National Emergency Number Association and Federal Communication Commission.


9-1-1 (countable and uncountable, plural 9-1-1s)


suicide bombing

suicide bombing (plural suicide bombings)

An attack carried out by a suicide bomber or a group of them.

عَمَلِيَّة تَفْجِيرِيَّة إِنْتِحَارِيَّة


NFA

Home Minister Hamzah Zainuddin said the case has been classified as "no further action" (NFA) due to lack of evidence.

2020 November 24, “Individuals linked to Chin Peng's ashes will not face charges - minister”, in Malaysiakini:

ACP Nik Ezanee closed the investigation by classifying it as no further action (NFA) after hearing about the woman's plight.

2021 January 31, Farik Zolkepli, “PJ police go the extra mile to help the needy”, in The Star:

Police have completed investigations into a Physical Education (PE) teacher who allegedly made a rape joke in front of his students at school, and have classified it as No Further Action (NFA).

2021 August 5, Muhaamad Hafis Nawawi, “Case of teacher who allegedly made rape joke classified as NFA”, in New Straits Times:

no further action
no further action#English

(law enforcement, criminal law, UK, Malaysia) Initialism of no further action; a potential outcome for a suspect from a police investigation.


NFA

en-verb

NFA (third-person singular simple present NFAs, present participle NFAing or NFA'ing, simple past and past participle NFAd or NFA'd or NFAed)

NFAs (present singular third-person)
NFAing (participle present)
NFA'ing (participle present)
NFAd (participle past)
NFAd (past)
NFA'd (participle past)
NFA'd (past)
NFAed (participle past)
NFAed (past)

After that interview, I think we can NFA him.

(law enforcement slang, UK) To formally end the police investigation of a suspect with no further action.


antismuggler

Thailand has built an antismuggler and antiterrorist fence along the Malaysian border.

1996, Martin Ira Glassner, Political geography, page 90:

(law enforcement) Acting to combat or prevent the activities of smugglers.


shaken baby syndrome

en-noun

shaken baby syndrome (countable and uncountable, plural shaken baby syndromes)

A trauma on the head that occurs when a child is violently shaken, creating a whiplash-type motion that causes acceleration-deceleration injuries, often without external signs of trauma.


fit up

en-verb

fit up (third-person singular simple present fits up, present participle fitting up, simple past and past participle fitted up)

fits up (present singular third-person)
fitting up (participle present)
fitted up (participle past)
fitted up (past)

The gun was placed in her car in an effort to fit her up.

(criminology, slang) Conspire to incriminate falsely a presumably innocent person.


sexual abuse

en-noun

sexual abuse (usually uncountable, plural sexual abuses)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-sexual abuse.wav

Statutory-rape laws concerning voluntary intercourse would probably be taken off the books, though both young boys and young girls could still be protected against any sexual abuse by older persons.

1971 October 4, ‘Facing Equality for Women’, Time:

1987, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure
I believe that I was the victim of sexual abuse in my relationship with T. It was always the way HE wanted it & I wasn't to do anything I wanted. So I just "submitted" to him & was glad that he would have anything to do with me.

Argentine priest Julio Grassi begins 15-year sentence over sexual abuse.

2013, The Guardian, (headline), 29 Sep 2013

(crime) Any sexual activity that is undesired by one participant but forced on them nonetheless, especially when considered to be more sustained or frequent than an incident of sexual assault.

seksuele misbruik

forcing of undesired sexual activity by one person on another


crime lord

The place felt more like a crime lord's den than anything else.

A person who is in charge of a criminal organization.

犯罪頭目 /犯罪头目

person in charge of a criminal organization


good cop bad cop

A psychological tactic used for interrogation, involving one police officer playing the role of intimidating adversary, and another that of friend with whom the subject is encouraged to bond.


killbot

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-killbot.wav

(especially science fiction) A robot designed to kill; a robotic assassin.


grandfather paradox

grandfather paradox (plural grandfather paradoxes)

From the paradox proposed by the French author René Barjavel in 1944 in his book Le Voyageur Imprudent, translated into English as "Future Times Three"; in its original form the paradox of one person going back to the past and killing their biological grandfather before the latter fathered the traveler's father, thus preventing the time traveler from ever being conceived in the first place.

The paradox of time travel in which inconsistencies emerge through changing the past.

Future Times Three
René Barjavel
grandfather paradox


hesitation wound

hesitation wound (plural hesitation wounds)

(pathology, criminology) Any of a series of shallow cuts made by a person considering a suicide attempt, or trying out the weapon to ascertain its effectiveness.


armed robbery

armed robbery (countable and uncountable, plural armed robberies)

(law) A theft where the thieves are armed with weapons.

سَطْو مُسَلَّح

instance of robbery where the participants are armed


beat cop

(US, slang) A police officer who patrols the streets on foot (walks the beat).


antiviolent

en-adj

antiviolent (comparative more antiviolent, superlative most antiviolent)

more antiviolent (comparative)
most antiviolent (superlative)

(law enforcement, sociology) Acting against or opposing violence.


corporatocracy

en-noun

corporatocracy (usually uncountable, plural corporatocracies)

He spent most of the 1970s and ’80s helping the evil corporatocracy that runs the Secret American Empire establish suzerainty over the Middle East, Southeast Asia, South America and Africa.

2007 July 15, Joe Queenan, “Covert Ops”, in New York Times:

This chapter examines the politics of America's corporatocracy, a political system in which powerful corporate interest groups dominate the policy agenda. We can see how the corporatocracy arose as the confluence of four big trends.

2011, Jeffrey Sachs, The Price of Civilization: Economics and Ethics After the Fall, Random House, →ISBN, page 105:


chum up

en-verb

chum up (third-person singular simple present chums up, present participle chumming up, simple past and past participle chummed up)

chums up (present singular third-person)
chumming up (participle present)
chummed up (participle past)
chummed up (past)

They have a practice of “chumming up” a new fellow-prisoner—beating him with old swords and staves kept in the prison for the purpose, to exact a fee of a half-crown.

1844 January 13, The Spectator, volume 17, number 811, page 28:

1849, John Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain, revised by Henry Ellis, London: Henry G. Bohn, Volume 2, p. 452,
Mr. Miller. They are not very nice whom they chum up?
Boot. Not very; they would as soon chum you up as anybody else.

(obsolete, UK, prison slang, transitive) To initiate (a new prisoner) through a ritual involving beating him with sticks and swords, accompanied by music, to extort money from him.


angel of mercy

A type of mercy killer, i.e., a caregiver who is a serial killer, and who practices mercy killing on both the willing and unwilling, knowing and unknowing, dependent only on the killer's sense of a patient's level of suffering from their illness.


final solution

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-final solution.wav

Criticizing China’s actions alone is not enough. The United States, which at first called the Nazis' Final Solution a "war rumor," according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, must not make the same mistake again. The United States cannot stand idly by and let its economic relationship with Beijing cloud its judgment.

2019, Grace Funk, “Opinion: The U.S. should do more to stop China's reeducation camps”, in Los Angeles Times:

(historical, often capitalized) The planned and attempted mass murder of the European Jews by the Nazis; the Holocaust.


detention centre

en-noun

detention centre (plural detention centres)

Australian immigration detention facilities

2002, Russell Hogg, Chapter 1: Prisoners and the Penal Estate in Australia, David Brown, Meredith Wilkie (editors), Prisoners as Citizens: Human Rights in Australian Prisons, page 3,
All jurisdictions have their own prison systems, although the Australia Capital Territory (ACT) has only one remand centre and one periodic detention centre.

A facility in which people are detained (held in custody); a jail.


antikidnapping

In the capital on Friday, a city police commander, Esteban Robles Espinosa, 52, who once headed the department’s antikidnapping division, was shot and killed as he left his house at 7:30 a.m.

2008 May 10, James C. Mckinley Jr., “Caught in a Swirl of Drug Violence, Mexico Vows to Fight Back”, in New York Times:

(law enforcement) Preventing or countering kidnapping.


antikidnap

He was never seen again, and the case remains unsolved today. Its haunting aftermath produced new antikidnap legislation[…]

2002, Michael Newton, The Encyclopedia of Kidnappings, page 187:

A first step in a company's defense against executive kidnapping is to develop a policy and obtain approval of an antikidnap plan.

2010, John Fay, Contemporary Security Management, page 359:


probation officer

probation officer (plural probation officers)

A law enforcement officer who supervises offenders who have been released from incarceration and, often, recommends sentencing in courts of law.


smokey

Short for Smokey Bear (“a cartoon Park Ranger”).

By the time we got into Tulsa Town
We had eighty-five trucks in all
But there's a roadblock up on the cloverleaf
And them bears was wall-to-wall.
Yeah, them smokies is thick as bugs on a bumper
They even had a bear in the air.

1975, “Convoy”, in C.W. McCall, Chip Davis (lyrics), Black Bear Road, performed by C. W. McCall:

The middle position, or "rocking chair," is so called because the drivers in the middle don't have to worry about watching for smokeys.

1977, Terry Cook, Vans and the Truckin' Life, page 27:

I was keeping an eye out for the smokeys who were no doubt hiding and waiting for unsuspecting tourists on the way in from Jacksonville.

2007, Ben W. Thompson, M'Naghten Rules, →ISBN:

Well let me tell you why I came, Crash: I need something from you, tonight. I had a four-man team for a big grab, lost one to smokies. I came looking to replace him, if you're still a badass.

2014, Nic Pizzolatto, 42:30 from the start, in True Detective, season 1, episode 4, spoken by Ginger (Joseph Sikora):

(CB slang) A state trooper. By extension, a cop, police officer.


come forward

en-verb

come forward (third-person singular simple present comes forward, present participle coming forward, simple past came forward, past participle come forward)

comes forward (present singular third-person)
coming forward (participle present)
came forward (past)
come forward (participle past)

I’m coming forward to publicly share my own story in the hope that I can encourage others to do the same and help tear down the wall of silence that perpetuates further abuse.

2014 August 29, Ruzwana Bashir, “The untold story of how a culture of shame perpetuates abuse. I know, I was a victim”, in The Guardian:

(intransitive, idiomatic, law, criminology) To offer help or information, especially about a crime.


bribetaking

My readers will bear in mind, that the “miscreant” has since been convicted and dismissed, for bribetaking and malversation of ofiice, in the cases, which were transmitted by Colonel Outram, and quashed by the said minute!

1853, Indus, Bombay Briberies; a tale of the present charter, page 45:

To look the dishonors straight in the face; to flay bribe-sanctioning at the top, as we flay bribetaking at the bottom; to see that the corrupting of a legislature is a darker and a meaner sin than the slugging of a scab; to ask for "law and order" among the mighty as we ask it among the obscure; to set ourselves grimly and a little sadly — as if with a sense of commmon frailty — to the great task of national house cleaning, is the solemn beginning to which we are committed in these early days of the twentieth century.

1909, John Graham Brooks, As Others See Us: A Study of Progress in the United States, page 344:

The union representing New York City carpenters, one of the area’s largest construction trades, continues to be roiled by turmoil after years of investigations into corruption and organized-crime influence and, since 2007, the federal convictions of four shop stewards for fraud, conspiracy or bribetaking.

2009 May 7, Paul Von Zielbauer, “New Fines Pit Carpenters Against Union Leaders”, in New York Times:


antilaundering

(law enforcement) Countering money laundering.


prison labor

Work which one is compelled to perform due to lack of options, by choice while in prison, or outright against one's will, while in a condition of confinement or slavery.


PNP

Philippine National Police
w:Philippine National Police

(Philippines, law enforcement) Initialism of Philippine National Police.


last meal

Inmate Arthur Dennis Rutherford, who was executed in Florida on October 18, 2006, enjoyed a last meal of fried catfish, fried green tomatoes, fried eggplant, hush puppies, and sweet tea.

2007, Lee Lofland, Howdunit Book of Police Procedure and Investigation: A Guide for Writers:

Heathers: the Musical - Dead Girl Walking
Cuz Heather says I gotsta go / You're my last meal on death row / Shut your mouth, and lose them tighty-whities!

A final meal that a prisoner may choose before being executed.


date rapist

1994. "Date Rape"
T. here is no such thing as the typical date rapist.

2009. "Sex and Society Volume 1"
The date rapist often plans a date intending to have sex with the woman.

2011. "Sex, Love, and Friendship"
Since dating behaviors are derived from the prostitution model, date rape, instead of being a crime of violence, ... The date rapist is confused.

It is very easy to fall prey to a date rapist if you are attractive and alone in a bar in a new city.

A person that commits date rape, typically a male perpetrator that commits a form of sexual assault or coercion upon a new acquaintance during what is usually a first date, either by force or with the assistance of a date rape drug.


confidence trick

en-noun

confidence trick (plural confidence tricks)

He was telling northern Europeans that some of the devotions which most deeply satisfied them […] were nothing but clerical confidence tricks.

2009, Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, Penguin, published 2010, page 558:

A method of cheating somebody by winning their confidence and inducing them to hand over money (or other valuables).


pickpurse

From Middle English pikepurse, pykeporse, equivalent to pick + purse.

Down with Christ's cross, up with purgatory pickpurse, up with him, the popish purgatory, I mean.

1548 January 18, Hugh Latimer, Sermon of the Plough, quoted in Sermons by Hugh Latimer, Cambridge University Press, published 1884, page 71:

No, it is false, if it is a pickpurse.

1602, William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor, act 1, scene 1:

(obsolete) Someone who steals purses, or money from purses.


thief in law

Calque of Russian вор в зако́не (vor v zakóne).

calque

вор в зако́не

A criminal who is respected, has authority and a high ranking status within the criminal underworld in the old Soviet Union, Russia and the republics that formed the former Soviet Union.


filcher

But to return — Poor Paddy had a wife,
 The very plague and torment of his soul,
The harbinger of battle and of strife,
 And, what was worse, the filcher of his bowl ;

1820 August, Daniel O'Rourke, “An Epic Poem, in Six Cantos”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume 7, number 41, page 35:

Well, she sneaks around the world from Kiev to Carolina / She's a sticky-fingered filcher from Berlin down to Belize

1991, “Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?”, Sean Altman, David Yazbek (music), performed by Rockapella:


bribeless

c. 1603?, Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Walter Raleigh's Pilgrimage
From thence to heaven's bribeless hall.

Incapable of being bribed, or without bribes.


prison bitch

What kind of life can a prison bitch expect to lead once he is released?

2004, Alexander Cockburn, Serpents in the garden: liaisons with culture & sex, page 273:

What's the tattoo for a prison bitch? A rabbit? A pansy? Maybe,” she added scornfully, “a nice big bull's eye tattooed right on your ass

2007, Gil Snider, Brain Warp: A Medical Thriller, page 255:

“More like the big house,” Tyree snapped. “Mama, I don't wanna end up a prison bitch,” Cecile cried.

2009, R.A. Melos, The Adventures of Homosexual Man and Lesbian Ladd, page 79:

(prison slang) A male prisoner used as a sex slave by another man in the absence of available women.


child neglect

A form of child abuse caused by the denial of basic needs like proper nutrition, care, and love.

nevypolnénije objázannostej v otnošénii rebjónka

невыполне́ние обя́занностей в отноше́нии ребёнка


home invasion

(law, criminology) An assault on the possessor(s) of a household committed by an intruder by using forced entry or otherwise having unauthorized presence in the household.


light-handed

en-adj

light-handed (comparative lighter-handed or more light-handed, superlative lightest-handed or most light-handed)

lighter-handed (comparative)
more light-handed (comparative)
lightest-handed (superlative)
most light-handed (superlative)

From Middle English lyghte handyd, from light (adjective) + honded, participle of honden (“to seize, take charge of”), from the noun hond (“hand”). See more at hand.

Thae Hielandmen are o' the westland clans, and just as light-handed as their neighbours, an a' tales be true

Indeed, she knew how to make young Deelbelicket, old Dougald Baresword, the Laird of Bandybrawl, and others, pay for the hospitality which she did not think proper to deny them, by rendering them useful in her negociations with the light-handed lads beyond the Cairn, who, finding their late object of plunder was allied to "kend folks, and owned by them at kirk and market," became satisfied, on a moderate yearly composition, to desist from their depredations.

1822, [Walter Scott], chapter IV, in The Pirate. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC, page 68:

He has a great many amusing episodes describing the light-handed lads from the hills coming down, and in the general confusion of the times plundering Cavalier and Covenanter alike; [...]

1862, Blackwood's Magazine, volume 91, page 313:

Another of his duties was to keep a sharp look-out for light-handed customers, besides other occupations which time, as Mr. Blackley said, would teach him.

1894, “Autumn Leaves: Worth a Guinea”, in Charles Dickens, Jr., editor, All the Year Round, page 26:

You understand what darkies are—as curious as magpies and quite as lighthanded. If one of them had chanced to see Effingham hiding something behind the clock, he would be sure to investigate for himself at the first convenient opportunity.

1922, Van Tassel Sutphen, In Jeopardy, →ISBN:

Captive rowlocks keep the oars in the boat while you 're rowing and discourage lighthanded hardware seekers when you go ashore.

1997 January, Time Carr, “Choosing A Dinghy -- The Hard Way”, in Cruising World:


wokou

From Mandarin 倭寇 (wōkòu, “Japanese pirates”).

(historical) Pirates of a mixture of ethnicities who raided the coastlines of China and Korea from the 13th to 16th centuries.


big business

Because he is liberal, temperate and articulate, and because he freely recognizes past Big Business abuses, Wendell L. Willkie, president of huge Commonwealth & Southern Corp., is in a class by himself as a persuasive businessman-critic of the New Deal. . . . "Today it is not Big Business that we have to fear," concluded Businessman Wilkie. "It is Big Government."

1940 March 18, “Life on the Newsfronts of the World: Big Government”, in Life, retrieved 2011-12-13, page 26:

In an uncharacteristic rebuff to big business, President Carlos Saul Menem plans this week to propose a package of labor regulations that leaves intact most Government-mandated severance benefits and limits companies' right to hire part-time workers.

1998 March 17, Clifford Krauss, “International Business: Argentine Labor Code Largely Intact”, in New York Times, retrieved 2011-12-14:

That smacks of cozy dealings between the government and the tycoons . . . . "Invariably, people see this as a conspiracy between the government and big business," says legislator Alan Leong.

2005 January 17, Chaim Estulin, “Hong Kong's New Culture”, in Time:

(sometimes capitalized) Large, for-profit corporations collectively, understood as having significant economic, political, or social influence.


pill mill

2011, Jane Musgrave, The Palm Beach Post, 4 men sentenced in pill mill scheme, link
Four men who helped Jeff and Chris George run their lucrative pill mills received sentences ranging from 9 months to 14 years today in federal court.

2014, JB McMunn, M.D., Naked Capitalism, The Stealthy, Ugly Growth of Corporatized Medicine, link
Needless to say, the professional bullying from the primary care physicians (PCPs) and the [hospital] administrators to run both a pill mill and a needle jockey business was tremendous. I resisted the entire time, but god it wore me out. [From a pain specialist for a large multi-specialty group.]

(idiomatic) A clandestine operation where a medical worker illicitly offers prescription medication to patients in exchange for bribes.


muzzler

A pickpocket working individually, apart from their normal gang.


wag-halter

I can tell you, I am a mad waghalter.

1613, John Marston, William Barksted, The Insatiate Countess, I.1:

(obsolete) Someone who is likely to swing in a halter; someone likely to be hanged.


whirlpooling

It makes no sense to say that the whirlpool is “here” and the ocean “there.” Whirlpooling is a feature of the ocean.

2020, Seth Zuihō Segall, Buddhism and Human Flourishing: A Modern Western Perspective, page 121:

The action of liquid swirling around, forming a whirlpool.

"In dozens of separate 'whirlpooling' incidents, groups of teenage boys surrounded a girl in the water, tore off her swimsuit top and then grabbed her breasts."

2007, Jeff Wiltse, Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pools in America, The University of North Carolina Press, page 212:

The assault, undressing and groping of a woman by men in an aquatic setting.

(brewing) A method of separating the trub from the wort, involving centrifugal force.


Florida flambe

Medina was killed, then cooked, becoming the second inmate in seven years to suffer the Florida flambe.

1997 April 5, Leonard Pitts, “Fiery execution shows lie of ‘humane’ death penalty”, in The Free Lance-Star, page A15:

There's a nice new death chamber in Terre Haute, Ind., just waiting for ya. No Florida flambe there. A slight boo-boo occurred not long ago when Florida fired up "Old Sparky" to execute a criminal. The guy's face mask flared up. Most grisly. A Florida district attorney glibly said the moral of the mishap was not to commit crime in Florida if you don't want the same treatment.

1997 June 6, Elizabeth Jarnagin, “Pro-life consistency means opposing death penalty”, in Amarillo Globe-News:

This is why harris should go down in Florida Flambe.

2005 August 19, Cha, “Ms. Harris's "felon purge"”, in democraticunderground.com:

(derogatory) Burning (catching fire) during execution by electric chair.

Capital punishment in Florida
Old Sparky


prisonment

en-noun

prisonment (countable and uncountable, plural prisonments)

Partly from prison + -ment, partly shortened from imprisonment.

Yet will I never of my love repent, / But joy that for his sake I suffer prisonment.

1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:


nuthook

Nuthook, nuthook, you lie.

c. 1596–1599, William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part 2, act 5, scene 4:

(obsolete) A bailiff who metaphorically hooks or seizes malefactors; a policeman; a constable.


prison guard

And Tietelbaum has been bought and sold so many times by the dark Republican powers that be, look at the prisonguard beating trial and the Ventura County sewer fiasco.

1997, Gary Indiana, Resentment: A comedy, New York: Anchor Books, published 1998, →ISBN, →OL, page 170:

During his services as a praetorian, Caesium Verus was twice promoted, first to tubicen (trumpeter), then to optio carceris (camp prisonguard): ordinatus tubicem item optio at carcarem factus est.

1987, Arctos: Acta philologica fennica, volumes 21-23, page 29:

The Telfaire Prisonguard towers rise miragelike in the swampy sunlight like giant mushroom caps on grey concrete stalks.

2011, Marc Ian Barasc, The Compassionate Life: Walking the Path of Kindness, San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, →ISBN:

(law enforcement) An armed person working to provide order, security, discipline, punishment, and prevent escapes of prisoners in a jail that answers to a warden.

zindançı

person working to provide order to in a jail


Norteño

Borrowed from Spanish norteño (“northerner”), from the gang's territory in Northern California.

(ethnic slur, offensive) A Mexican gang.

(ethnic slur, offensive) A Mexican gang member.

(ethnic slur, offensive) A Mexican or Hispanic person.


pickery

From pick (“to steal”), or perhaps from pickeer.

If any man be taken with theft or pickery, and thereof convicted, he shall have his head polled, and hot pitch poured upon his pate […]

1577, Raphaell Holinshed, The Firste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande […], volume I, London: […] [Henry Bynneman] for Iohn Harrison, →OCLC:


stateprison

On his way, under the care of the sheriff of Oswego county, to the stateprison, Lett made his escape, at the imminent peril of his life, by leaping from a railroad car while it was under full motion.

1841, William H. Seward, letter to Mr. Webster:

(US, dated) A prison maintained by the state.


stitch-up

Wilson's election as leader was a stitch-up by the committee.

Lynch added: "Our findings from our FOI requests on ticket office closures shows the whole process to be a stitch-up between the train operators, under the auspices of the Rail Delivery Group[,] and ministers.

2023 October 18, Mel Holley, “Network News: Harper attacks Labour over strikes... but unions hit back”, in RAIL, number 994, page 18:

(British, slang) Something arranged deceitfully and in secret.

interne Vereinbarung

something arranged deceitfully and in secret


prolicide

prolicide (countable and uncountable, plural prolicides)

Latin proles (“offspring”) + caedere (“kill”). Equivalent to + -cide.

PROLICIDE […] Admits of two divisions, fœticide or criminal abortion and infanticide or the destruction of the new born infant.

1827, Robley Dunglison, Syllabus of the Lectures on Medical Jurisprudence, page 93:

(uncountable) The crime of destroying one's offspring, either in the womb or after birth.


DARVO

Acronym of “Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender”. Coined by Jennifer J. Freyd in “Violations of power, adaptive blindness, and betrayal trauma theory” (1997), Feminism & Psychology.

For quotations using this term, see Citations:DARVO.

Initialism of deny, attack, and reverse victim and offender: a behavior of perpetrators of wrongdoing (especially sexual offenders), when accused of attacking their victim, reversing the roles of victim and offender.


surveillance camera

surveillance camera (plural surveillance cameras)

Coldly perusing his surveillance cameras one day, Mr. Burns spies nothing but grotesque misconduct: Instead of working, his employees engage in limbo contests, chess games, and, of course, cockfights.

2012 May 20, Nathan Rabin, “TV: Review: THE SIMPSONS (CLASSIC): “Marge Gets A Job” (season 4, episode 7; originally aired 11/05/1992)”, in The Onion AV Club:

A reported 200m surveillance cameras around the country are doing everything from tracking shoppers in stores to preventing violent crime to catching jaywalkers.

2019 May 21, Dylan Curran, “Facial recognition will soon be everywhere. Are we prepared?”, in The Guardian:

closed-circuit television
closed-circuit television

A mounted video camera used for the purpose of surveillance, as part of closed-circuit television.


murder by suicide

murder by suicide (countable and uncountable, plural murders by suicide)

We may arrange for the best airport security in the world, but if you want to commit murder by suicide, you don’t have to board a plane to explode yourself and kill many people.

2006, Haim Harari, View from the Eye of the Storm: Terror And Reason in the Middle East, page 33:

An act (such as a suicide bombing) in which a person kills one or more other persons before, or while, killing himself or herself; the act of killing others and oneself in this way.


juvenile delinquency

(law) Participation in illegal behaviour by minors.

yuvenal cinayətkarlıq

participation in illegal behaviour by minors


slavocracy

This pressure brought the Southern slavocracy into conflict with Northern business interests. Slaveowners precipitated a war to defend the slave system and its accompanying way of life.

1993, Melvin M. Leiman, Political Economy of Racism, Pluto Press, →ISBN, page 35:

Close on their heels was any Texan who had ever said a word against the slaveocracy, or the cotton men, or was suspected of voting for Lincoln.

2013, Philipp Meyer, The Son, Simon & Schuster, published 2014, page 440:

(US, chiefly historical) The persons or interest representing slavery politically, or wielding political power for the preservation or advancement of slavery.


security camera

security camera (plural security cameras)

A video camera used to protect a building from intruders and to detect crime and other issues.


bloodlusty

en-adj

bloodlusty (comparative more bloodlusty, superlative most bloodlusty)

more bloodlusty (comparative)
most bloodlusty (superlative)

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Exhibiting bloodlust; violently aggressive; bloodthirsty.


prisoner of conscience

en-noun

prisoner of conscience (plural prisoners of conscience)

Defined by Peter Benenson in his article "The Forgotten Prisoners" in 1961.

Anyone imprisoned because of his race, religion, or political views.


blue wall of silence

blue wall of silence (plural blue walls of silence)

We've all heard of the Blue Wall of Silence, the code under which cops stay mum about rogue cops who poison the barrel.

1985 June 25, Sydney H. Schanberg, “New York: The Concrete Wall of Silence”, in New York Times, retrieved 2012-08-12:

When the blue wall of silence broke, it was all over for New York City police officer Justin Volpe. The witnesses for the prosecution had badges, and they had stories to tell.

1999 May 25, Frank Pellegrini, “Too Despicable for the Blue Wall of Silence”, in Time:

The indictment of officer Michael Roberts also highlights another color barrier that can complicate matters of police discipline—that's the so-called blue wall of silence. Former Minneapolis police officer Mike Quinn says that wall is what keeps some cops from turning in their fellow cops.

2008 July 15, Brandt Williams, Elizabeth Stawicki, “Minneapolis cop indicted on corruption charges”, in Minnesota Public Radio, retrieved 2012-08-12:

On the streets it is called "No snitching." In law enforcement it is called "The blue wall of silence".

2009 June 6, Donald Winkfield, “Manhattan DA’s Keystone Verdict”, in Black Star News, retrieved 2012-08-12:

(idiomatic) Strict secretiveness maintained by the members of a police force with respect to information which might be contrary to their interests, especially information concerning questionable police actions.


blue wall

From blue + wall. From the representative color of the political party, and the solidity of support for that party in that region.

blue wall of silence
blue wall of silence#English

(law enforcement politics) Alternative form of blue wall of silence


pak pai

From Cantonese 白牌車 /白牌车 (baak⁶ paai⁴⁻² ce¹), literally ‘white numberplate’.

He took pak-pai'''s, knowing they were less under the thumb of the police.

1977, John Le Carré, The Honourable Schoolboy, Folio Society, published 2010, page 471:

(now historical) A car used as an illegal taxi in Hong Kong.


rouf

(slang, crime) A prison sentence of four years.

The number four.
A prison sentence of four years.


SOCO

scenes of crime officer
w:Scenes of Crime officer

(UK, law enforcement) Acronym of scenes of crime officer.


broken windows theory

After article propounding the theory by social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling, “Broken Windows”, Atlantic Monthly (March 1982).

Clark disliked the general state of unshavenness, partly for aesthetic reasons and partly because he was a believer in the broken-windows theory of urban-crime management, the way the appearance of dereliction can pave the way for more serious crimes.

2014, Emily St. John Mandel, Station Eleven, Picador (2022), page 249:

(criminology) A criminological theory stating that signs of urban decay (e.g. broken windows, graffiti) signal that an area is not monitored, encouraging more destructive criminal behavior.


moving violation

moving violation (plural moving violations)

Under present law, the Department of Public Safety can suspend a license from 30 to 90 days when the holder accumulates three moving violations.

1959 May 20, Taking Violators Off the Road, St Petersburg Times, p. 8A

(US, Canada, Australia, law enforcement) Violation of the law by the driver of a vehicle while in motion.

Verkehrsverstoß

violation of law by the driver of a moving vehicle


juarez

Blend of wares + Ciudad Juárez, a Mexican city on that country's border with the United States. The border is often publicly associated with illicit trafficking.

(Internet slang, leetspeak, offensive) Alternative form of warez


juarez

en-verb

juarez (third-person singular simple present juarezes, present participle juarezing, simple past and past participle juarezed)

juarezes (present singular third-person)
juarezing (participle present)
juarezed (participle past)
juarezed (past)


Dixonian

From Dixon + -ian. From the BBC drama series Dixon of Dock Green.

This was as true in 1974 when Regan first appeared as it is to police dramas in the twenty-first century. Notwithstanding his abrasive, recusant stance, Regan still stood for many of the core Dixonian values championed twenty years earlier.

2003, Frank Leishman, Paul Mason, Policing and the Media: Facts, Fictions and Factions, page 75:

However, 'nuisance or anti-social behaviour' is a source of grave unhappiness to millions. It is also the very thing that the old Dixonian police force was very good at controlling, discouraging and preventing.

2003, Peter Hitchens, A Brief History of Crime, page 99:

We have presented a model of policing to the public, a Dixonian model, which is oversimplified. It is about bobbies on the beat and their front police station counter.

2008 November 17, Ken Jones, Evidence to the Communities and Local Government Committee, page 61:

(UK) Pertaining to a traditional form of local policing, focused on officers walking the beat.


scapegallows

From scape (archaic for escape) + gallows.

compound

archaic for <i class="Latn mention" lang="en">escape</i>

[…] And remember this, 'scapegallows,' said Ralph, menacing him with his hand, 'that if we meet again, and you so much as notice me by one begging gesture, you shall see the inside of a jail once more […]

1838–1839, Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby:

(colloquial, dated) A criminal who has narrowly escaped being hanged.


signaletic

en-adj

signaletic (comparative more signaletic, superlative most signaletic)

more signaletic (comparative)
most signaletic (superlative)

The wording of the legislation was somewhat open-ended in that it authorized not only the Bertillon signaletic system, but also "any measurements, processes or operations sanctioned by the Governor in Council having the like object in view."

1996, Louis A. Knafla, Criminal Justice History: An International Annual:

(criminology, historical) Related to or involving the Bertillon system of anthropometry.


swy

(Australia, slang) A two-year prison sentence.


antiextortion

In response, the federal authorities initiated a nationwide antiextortion program, including a national database to track protection rackets and a promise to protect all willing to formally complain about extortion practices.

2010, Niels A. Uildriks, Mexico's Unrule of Law, page 226:


ankle monitor

A device that individuals under house arrest or parole are often required to wear to track their location.

踝關節監視器 /踝关节监视器

device individuals under house arrest are often required to wear


esclop

We had not been engaged in our reading very long when at the far end of the arch I noticed a twinkling light. "Kool esclop!" shouted one of the boys, at the same moment doucing the glim and bolting with his companion, leaving me in the dark with my upset beer bottle and my douced candle, forming a spectacle which seemed to arouse suspicion on the part of our friend the policeman, whose light it was that had appeared in the distance.

1903 October, Rev. Arthur Tappan Pierson, quoting Hogg, Quintin, “Quintin Hogg and the London Polytechnic”, in Missionary Review of the World, volume 26, number 16, page 734:


money mule

Fraudsters known as “herders” recruit money mules, creating vast webs of linked online accounts. This enables stolen money to pass swiftly through multiple banks, often via different countries, before the criminals cash out the proceeds — making it virtually impossible to trace.

2020 December 8, Claer Barrett, “Could your child be recruited as a money mule?”, in Financial Times:

(crime, finance, slang) A person who transfers stolen or defrauded money or merchandise from one country to another, either in person, through a courier service, or electronically.


spree killer

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A murderer who kills two or more victims in a short time in multiple locations.


culeus

From Latin culeus (“large leather sack, punishment of drowning within a sack, unit of bulk liquid measure”), from Ancient Greek κολεός (koleós, “sheath”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱel- (“to cover”). Doublet of cullion and cojones.

bor

(historical, law) A Roman punishment—chiefly for parricide—involving blindfolding, beating, confinement to a leather sack, and drowning in a river or sea.


FGM

Coordinate term: MGM

I met Leyla Hussein, an FGM survivor and anti-FGM activist, and we hit it off straight away. […] I worried that I didn’t have a right to talk about FGM as I don’t come from an FGM-practising community, but Leyla believes you can talk about whatever you like, regardless of whether you’ve been directly affected.

2015 April 11, Bridget Christie, “We’re a nation of armchair activists – what’s wrong with that?”, in The Guardian:

female genital mutilation
female genital mutilation#English

Initialism of female genital mutilation.


female genital mutilation

en-noun

female genital mutilation (countable and uncountable, plural female genital mutilations)

Any mutilation of the female genitals done for non-medical reasons, such as the infliction of abrasion, burns (chemical or cauterizing), or cuts or slits, or amputation or piercing.


capital murder

capital murder (countable and uncountable, plural capital murders)

(law) The crime of murder of a particular quality.


smurf account

Coined by Geoff Fraizer and Greg Boyko, who played the online multiplayer game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness under the names Shlonglor and Warp. The pair had become so proficient at the game that few people would play against them, so, in order to avoid scaring off potential competitors, they created alternate accounts named PapaSmurf and Smurfette (characters from the Smurfs comic franchise). However, the term first appears c. 1997. See cite below.

They were smurf accounts and other people and companies contracted by me. I never used my name.

1997, U.S. Government Printing Office, Law Enforcement Efforts to Combat International Money Laundering Through Black Market Peso Brokering, page 15:

(law enforcement, slang) A bank account of many intended to handle illicit money in amounts too small to raise suspicion.


buncher

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Often a buncher might come in a little early to have some work ready when rollers arrived.[…]If a buncher ran short of tobacco, the rollers got more for her.

1986, Charles Stephenson, Robert Asher, Life and Labor: Dimensions of American Working-Class History, page 199:

Stranded copper wire and cable are made on machines known as bunchers or stranders. Conventional bunchers are used for stranding small diameter wires (34 to 10 AWG).

1999, Günter Joseph, Konrad J. A. Kundig, Copper: Its Trade, Manufacture, Use and Environmental Status, page 255:

Something that bunches or causes to bunch.

(manufacturing) A machine that twists strands together during the manufacture of metal wire; a strander.

The pulse width can be decreased by means of a buncher, which consists of a longitudinal re-entrant cavity. The first electrons to reach the buncher are accelerated by a weaker longitudinal field than those that reach it at later times.

1998, Ludwig Reimer, Scanning Electron Microscopy: Physics of Image Formation and Microanalysis, page 44:

Amplification has taken place because in the buncher grids the electrons are affected very little, but in the drift space this effect is given time to grow and the bunching becomes much more pronounced.[…]After leaving the buncher field the electrons travel towards the plate, are slowed down, stopped and then reattracted by the buncher.

2000, Andrew Leven, Telecommunication Circuits and Technology, page 364:

A two cavity Klystron amplifier consists of a cathode, focussing electrodes, two buncher grids separated by a very small distance forming a gap of two catcher grids with small gap B followed by a collector.

2009, V.S.Bagad, Microwave & Radar Engineering, pages 5–8:

(electronics, physics) A circuit that causes electrons or other charged particles in a particle beam to group together.

2009, US Congress (editor), Congressional Record, V. 150, Part 6: April 20 2004 to May 4 2004, page 7574,
The undercover investigation of this facility has revealed that its proprietors were aware that some of the companion animals brought to the facility were stolen, and also revealed a list of over 50 “bunchers,” individuals who obtain animals and sell them to “random source” animal dealers. Bunchers have a variety of methods for obtaining companion animals, including responding to newspaper ads offering free animals, trespassing on private property to abduct the animals from yards, and house burglaries.

An illegitimate supplier of laboratory animals who obtains the animals by kidnapping pets or illegally trapping strays.

Each airfield had its own buncher which emitted a particular radio signal. Each plane had a radio compass so that when we flew toward the buncher, the compass would go straight up. When we flew over the buncher, it would point straight down.

2008, W. C. Gibson, “54: Lieutenant W.C. Gibson”, in Alan L. Griggs, editor, Flying Flak Alley: Personal Accounts of World War II Bomber Crew Combat, page 247:

(military, RAF, World War II) A ground-based radio transmitter, configured within a system to guide aircraft to their allocated airfields.


teensploitation

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-teensploitation.wav

From teen + -sploitation (from exploitation film). From 1980s.

We sat down to watch a teensploitation slasher flick.

With 1955's Blackboard Jungle—the first film to traffic heavily in youth rebellion and sex, the twin pillars of any teenager's existence—a brilliant, if obvious, new genre of film was born: teensploitation, movies about teenagers made for teenagers but watched by everybody.

1999 February, Bill Sienkiewicz, “Forever Young”, in SPIN, SPIN Media, page 64:

1999, Edmond Grant, The Motion Picture Guide: 1999 Annual (The Films of 1998), CineBooks, page vii,
Adrian Lyne's LOLITA was more notable for the terror it struck in controversy-shy American distributors than for its content, reducing taboo subject matter to a teensploitation film with a literary pedigree.

The influence of Rebel Without a Cause is difficult to underestimate.^([sic]) Despite what appeared to be just another entry in the burgeoning teensploitation trend, the film distinguished itself for a variety of reasons.

2005, Rob McInnes, Timothy Shary, Teen Movies: American Youth on Screen, Columbia University Press (Wallflower), page 21:

(film) A genre of exploitation films, starring teenage actors with teen-oriented plots involving drugs, sex, alcohol or crime.


red ball

* ("high-profile high-priority" sense) From a routing system on the Santa Fe Railroad in the early 1900s. Fast freight trains which were to receive priority routing were marked with placards depicting a red disc, and were called "red ball" trains.

A police-involved shooting is by definition a red ball and, by definition, a red ball requires every warm body.

1991, David Simon, Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, →ISBN, →OL:

The only exception to that edict was the Eighth, the French Quarter district, since any homicide at the core of the tourist area was such a potential red ball.

2005, Eileen Dreyer, Sinners and Saints, St. Martin's Press, →ISBN, →OL:

(law enforcement, slang, US) A high-profile high-priority case which draws political or media attention.


outkill

en-verb

outkill (third-person singular simple present outkills, present participle outkilling, simple past and past participle outkilled)

outkills (present singular third-person)
outkilling (participle present)
outkilled (participle past)
outkilled (past)

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Southerners do not outkill northerners in homicides carried out during robberies, they found, only in those sparked by quarrels.

2011, Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Penguin, published 2012, page 119:

(transitive, stative) To kill more than.


female genital cutting

Female genital cutting (FGC) is an ancient practice that affects girls and young women around the world, defining the identity of women in cultures where it is practised.

2007 May 9, Jean-Roger Kaseki, The Guardian:

Tolerance may run out, however, when a violation breaches a sacred value, as when immigrants to Western countries practice female genital cutting, honor killings, or the sale of underage brides […].

2011, Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Penguin, published 2012, page 764:

Female genital mutilation
female genital mutilation


doctor shopping

(medicine, crime) The illegal practice of a patient requesting treatment from multiple physicians in order to obtain prescription drugs, either to feed an addiction or resell them.


thrill kill

"It was a thrill kill. Robbery was an afterthought. This is one of the most senseless murders we've had down there in years."

1988 March 9, Sheridan R. Hansen, “Police arrest 2 Utah Count teenagers for questioning in Las Vegas shooting”, in Deseret News, retrieved 2013-05-17, page B3:

"[T]his essentially was a killing for no reason, a thrill kill. . . ," said Attorney Donald Macomber.

2012 April 12, “Supreme Court Hears Appeal of Colin Koehler's Life Sentence”, in WABI TV, retrieved 2013-05-17:

(idiomatic) An act of murder motivated solely by the murderer's desire to have a very exciting experience.


radar trap

In Rochester, after Kenneth Butters complained about fast driving along Woodbine Avenue, police set up a radar trap and nabbed five speeders, including Butters.

1956 September 10, “Miscellany”, in Time:

He had been allegedly clocked by a mobile radar trap on the M2 at Winston Hills at 120kmh in a 100kmh zone.

2006 December 27, Dylan Welch, “Shots fired at bus and police”, in Sydney Morning Herald, Australia, retrieved 2013-06-03:

A roadside location, manned by police or similar officials, where a device that emits a radar beam is used to monitor the speeds of motor vehicles in order to apprehend motorists in violation of the speed limit.


Det.

(law, law enforcement) Abbreviation of detective.


iron triangle

Together, agribusiness, shipping companies and NGOs form what some have called the “iron triangle” of special interests, blocking reform of the controversial in-kind system.

2012 July 19, Claire Provost, “US food aid: the special interests blocking reform”, in The Guardian:

(by extension) Any self-reinforcing power structure, whether intentional or accidental, formal or informal.


all-points bulletin

en-noun

all-points bulletin (plural all-points bulletins)

(law enforcement) A broadcast issued from one law enforcement agency to another, typically containing information about a wanted suspect or a person of interest.


OFC

(military, law enforcement) Abbreviation of officer.


kito

This type of blackmail, where an LGBT person is entrapped, is known in Nigeria's gay community as "kito" - the exact origin of the term is unclear. BBC Africa Eye interviewed 21 people in all about their experiences of being "kito'd".

2023 May 15, Ian Wafula, Tamasin Ford, “The Nigerians lured into a trap and blackmailed for being gay”, in BBC News:

One LGBTQ+ advocacy group that works with Nigerians told BBC Africa Eye that, each week, 15 to 20 people reach out to them with similar stories of entrapment and extortion. The scheme is known in Nigeria's gay community as "kito."

2023 May 16, Dylan Reber, “Gay Men in Nigeria Targeted in Dating App Extortion Scheme”, in Advocate:

(Nigeria, LGBTQ) A type of blackmail on LGBT people


Insp

(law enforcement) Abbreviation of inspector.


stop-and-search

Adding to the department's problems is a long-running controversy over a stop-and-search policy that includes random searches of young black men.

1990 January 18, Constance L. Hays, “3 Cases Raise Questions on Boston Police Methods”, in New York Times, retrieved 2013-08-20:

The high court renewed its decision to throw out evidence in a 1992 Montgomery County traffic stop-and-search case that uncovered a small amount of marijuana and a methamphetamine pill.

1997 November 13, Rob Modic, “Motorist Must Know "Free to Go"”, in Dayton Daily News, USA, retrieved 2013-08-20:

Both parties support ‘stop and search’ – also known as ‘sus’ laws. Under these laws, the police can stop anyone under ‘reasonable’ suspicion that they could commit a crime.

2008, Simon Assaf, “London mayor elections: Ken and Boris launch a war on young people”, in Socialist Worker, UK, retrieved 2013-08-20:

A U.S. judge has ruled the New York Police Department has violated the rights of tens of thousands of people by intentionally discriminating against racial minorities with its controversial "stop-and-search" policy.

2013 August 12, “US Court says NYPD ‘Stop-and-Search’ Violates Rights”, in Voice of America, retrieved 2013-08-20:

(law, law enforcement) Of or pertaining to laws or policing practices, found in some jurisdictions, which permit a law enforcement officer to temporarily detain and search a member of the public based on the officer's suspicions.


lock someone up and throw away the key

en-verb

lock<> someone up and throw<,,threw,thrown> away the key

lock someone up and throw away the key (third-person singular simple present locks someone up and throws away the key, present participle locking someone up and throwing away the key, simple past locked someone up and threw away the key, past participle locked someone up and thrown away the key)

(idiomatic, informal) To lock someone up in prison indefinitely.


racial profiling

en-noun

racial profiling (usually uncountable, plural racial profilings)

This legislation represents a substantial step toward ending an insidious form of discrimination that is plaguing African-American and Hispanic drivers on our roadways — racial profiling.

1999, Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 106th Congress, First Session, vol. 145, part 5, p. 6720 (Google preview)

A recent report on the Ontario government's safe schools policy in the Toronto district school board addressed the issue of racial profilings in the educational system, especially with regard to the disproportionate impact of suspensions and expulsions on racialized students.

2006, Grace-Edward Galabuzi, Canada's Economic Apartheid, →ISBN, page 192:

A special unit of the TSA at Newark Liberty International Airport, trained to detect suspicious behavior, reportedly earned the nickname "Mexican hunters" for racial profiling.

2011 June 15, “Quotes of the Day”, in Time, retrieved 2013-09-10:

A recent campaign by Stockholm police to crack down on illegal immigrants by racial profiling at the city's subway turnstiles has formed the backdrop to a reignited debate about racism.

2013 April 2, Sven Hultberg Carlsson, “Does Sweden have a racial profiling problem?”, in Christian Science Monitor, retrieved 2013-09-10:

Racial profiling is emerging as a flashpoint in Japan as increasing numbers of migrant workers, foreign residents and mixed-race Japanese change the country’s traditionally homogenous society and test deep-seated suspicion toward outsiders.

2024 March 4, Victoria Kim, Hisako Ueno, “Racial Profiling in Japan Is Prevalent but Unseen, Some Residents Say”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(public policy, law enforcement) The practice (usually considered discreditable), by some police and other officials, of treating members of certain racial groups as more likely to be involved in criminal or other antisocial behavior than members of other racial groups.


ITO

(law enforcement) Initialism of information to obtain order.; A search warrant


youth detention centre

youth detention centre (plural youth detention centres)

juvenile delinquents
juvenile delinquent

A secure residential facility for young people, often termed juvenile delinquents, awaiting court hearings and/or placement in long-term care facilities and programs.


clean chit

clean chit (countable and uncountable, plural clean chits)

(India) A (usually oral) exoneration given by law enforcement agencies to suspects in a crime, likely to be flawed.


hybristophilia

From Ancient Greek ὑβρίζειν (hubrízein, “to commit an outrage against someone”), + -philia.

bor

A paraphilia involving attraction to somebody who has committed a crime or outrage.


SHU

administrative segregation

security housing unit or special handling unit

He picked a fight on the yard and got himself put into the SHU the day before my release.

2018, Tayari Jones, An American Marriage, Oneworld Publications, page 200:

security housing unit
security housing unit#English


SCU

solitary confinement
solitary confinement#English

Initialism of solitary confinement unit.


SCU

Sacra Corona Unita
Sacra Corona Unita#Italian

(crime) Abbreviation of Sacra Corona Unita (“United Sacred Crown”), the Puglia mafia.


crimen injuria

From Latin crīmen (“crime”) + ablative form of iniūria (“injury”).

The four students about whom headlines of the urination into a pot of stew for blacks went around the world will go on trial—later—in August this year, charged with crimen injuria.

2012, Nadine Gordimer, No Time Like the Present, Bloomsbury, published 2013, page 288:

(criminal law, chiefly South Africa) In Roman-Dutch law, the unlawful and intentional impairment of someone's dignity (covering road rage, stalking, and various kinds of abuse).


autogenocide

From auto- + genocide, coined in the late 1970s.

If Anita Bryantt really wants to devastate gay liberation, she should pry her fingers from her Bible long enough to thumb through the printed gay media. Scathing onslaughts may be fun, but they aren't very productive. Will we never cease practicing intellectual autogenocide?

1977 April 30, Hugh Crell, “Unproductive Onslaughts”, in Gay Community News, page 4:

Genocide of a particular group by members of that group.


particeps criminis

en-noun

particeps criminis (plural particeps criminis or particepes criminis)

particeps criminis (plural)
particepes criminis (plural)

From Latin particeps + crīminis, literally “participant in the crime”.

com

“I have heard too that he was particeps criminis in some road-agent work before he came here and attached himself to the courthouse.”

(law) An accomplice in crime; an accessory.


wanted poster

A poster that is distributed to the public, informing them of a person whom the authorities wish to apprehend.


wage theft

The illegal withholding of wages or denial of benefits that are rightfully owed to an employee.


jarkman

Allusion has been made to forged certificates. These were manufactured by a class of mendicants who had something in them of clerkly skill. They were called Jarkmen, Jark being the cant term for a seal.

1849, “The Beggars of London”, in The New Monthly Magazine, volume 85:

(obsolete) A forger of counterfeit seals, licenses or other documents.


battered baby syndrome

shaken baby syndrome
shaken baby syndrome#English


dark money

In Colorado, at least $18 million in dark money was spent on behalf of Cory Gardner, the Republican newly elected to the Senate; $4 million was spent on behalf of Senator Mark Udall, the Democratic incumbent.

2014 November 8, “Dark Money Helped Win the Senate”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

The Senate budget committee held a hearing on Wednesday morning to scrutinize the role of oil- and gas-linked “dark money” in delaying climate action – and tearing through local and federal budgets.

2023 June 21, Dharna Noor, “Senate examines role of ‘dark money’ in delaying climate action”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(US politics) Funds used to pay for an election campaign that are not disclosed to voters prior to voting, whether spent on behalf of a candidate running in an election, or to influence voting on a ballot.


antinarcotic

en-adj

antinarcotic (comparative more antinarcotic, superlative most antinarcotic)

more antinarcotic (comparative)
most antinarcotic (superlative)

(law enforcement) Opposing or countering narcotics.


blue meanie

Introduced or popularised by the Beatles film Yellow Submarine (1968).
(police officer): An allusion to the colour of their uniforms.

(slang) Panaeolus cyanescens, a kind of magic mushroom.


ducks and geese

Cockney rhyming slang
Cockney rhyming slang


thin blue line

By analogy with Thin Red Line. “Blue” refers to the color of the uniforms of many police departments.

“Obviously, you’ve seen caravans with the Trump flag in the back of pickup trucks and then the thin blue line,” Mr. DeMasi, a former police officer, said. “I think maybe people had a good intention, but it ended up giving the meaning of the thin blue line a black eye.”

2020 November 21, Michael Gold, “What Happened When a School District Banned Thin Blue Line Flags”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

A flag or symbol representing the police, commonly associated with the blue lives matter movement.


Queen's cowboy

(Canada, slang) A member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.


protection racket

en-noun

protection racket (plural protection rackets)

(crime) A criminal scheme in which victims are required to pay in order to avoid violence or destruction of property.


mafia state

A system in which the government is tied with organized crime.


protective custody

A so‐called star witness in the Brooklyn grand jury inquiry of alleged links between the police and gamblers sought unsuccessfully yesterday to free himself from protective custody.

1964 July 25, Alfred E. Clark, “Gambling Witness Under Guard Fails in Move to Gain Freedom”, in New York Times, retrieved 2014-06-03:

The government has earmarked a paltry $1.2 million . . ., not enough to properly fund even the state-run counseling centers—the only institutions with the authority to put battered children into protective custody.

1999 June 7, Donald MacIntyre, Hiroko Tashiro, “Hearing Their Cries”, in Time, retrieved 2014-06-03:

Authorities charged a man today with 'arson causing death' after a week of devasting fires that killed a total of more than 180 people in Australia, and whisked him into protective custody to guard him from public fury.

2009 February 13, Tanalee Smith, “Man charged over deadly Australian fire”, in The Independent, UK, retrieved 2014-06-03:

(law enforcement) Lawful confinement of a person or close supervision of his or her movements, on a voluntary or involuntary basis, by authorities in order to safeguard that person from attack or other dangers.


protection money

Those in the Lowland line who lay near him, and desired to enjoy their lives and property in quiet, were contented to pay him a small composition, in name of protection money, and comforted themselves with the old proverb that it was better to "fleech the deil than fight him."

1827, Sir Walter Scott, "The Highland Widow" ch. 2, in The Chronicles of the Canongate

[T]he police had raised the tariff for sporting houses, and would collect seventy-five and a hundred a month protection money.

1912, David Graham Phillips, chapter 13, in Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise:

Four members of an Asian gang were arrested yesterday and charged with extortion and conspiracy for demanding protection money from Chinese restaurants in Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

1993 June 15, “Four Men Arrested In Protection Scheme”, in New York Times, retrieved 2014-06-04:

[T]he Mungiki . . . hit the headlines in April with a string of beheadings as they tussled for control of lucrative bus routes by executing drivers and conductors who refused to pay protection money.

2007 November 6, Rob Crilly, “Kenya Accused of Mass Killings”, in Time, retrieved 2014-06-04:

[T]he FSB, interior ministry and police collect protection money from businesses.

2010 December 1, Luke Harding, “WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as 'mafia state'”, in The Guardian, UK, retrieved 2014-06-04:

Money paid, especially at regular intervals, to criminals or to corrupt officials who threaten to cause harm to the payer or to his or her business if the money is not paid.

protecció

money regular interval, extorted by criminals threatening to cause harm


resurrection man

resurrection man (plural resurrection men)

resurrection (“the act of rising from the dead and becoming alive again”) + man

Persons (under the name of resurrection-men) continue their business, getting from 1 guinea to 5 or 6, according to the value set upon the corpse they take up.

1781, “R. King”, in Compl. Mod. London Spy, section 106:

Earlier exhumations seem to have caused very little popular concern;... but later... the trade of ‘resurrection man’ became commoner, and attracted the lowest dregs of the vicious classes.

1910, Encyclopædia Britannica, I. 937/2:

(euphemistic, historical) A man who sells cadavers to anatomists, surgeons, etc., especially by exhuming corpses from graves; a graverobber.


child labour

(British spelling, Canadian spelling) Work performed by a minor that is prohibited by statute law, or under terms and conditions considered inhumane.


live at Her Majesty's pleasure

en-verb

live at Her Majesty's pleasure (third-person singular simple present lives at Her Majesty's pleasure, present participle living at Her Majesty's pleasure, simple past and past participle lived at Her Majesty's pleasure)

lives at Her Majesty's pleasure (present singular third-person)
living at Her Majesty's pleasure (participle present)
lived at Her Majesty's pleasure (participle past)
lived at Her Majesty's pleasure (past)

From the legal phrase at Her Majesty's pleasure.

'I treat patients who are living at Her Majesty's pleasure. They come to the hospital from Full Sutton prison and they are treated in the same way as anyone else.'

1999 January 3, John Arlidge, quoting Professor Alan Roberts, “Yakuza given a helping hand by 'Mr Fingers'”, in The Observer:

I wrote to Charlie Bronson in prison, 'cos Charles sends me letters and amazing drawings; my mate Warwick, who is also banged up, and numerous others living at Her Majesty's pleasure

2003, Dave Courtney, The Ride's Back On, →ISBN, page 174:

The look he gives me makes me realise I've lost him. 'Why would my uncle steal from his own brother for fifteen years? I've never found the reason, but I've heard every single excuse, courtesy of my friends living at Her Majesty's Pleasure.'

2008, Kate Harrison, The Secret Shopper's Revenge, →ISBN:

But the quest to make our jails a less pleasant place in which to live at Her Majesty’s pleasure must never translate into a lack of care, or a slipping of basic standards.

2014 April 25, “Star comment: Youths in prison still need care”, in Shropshire Star (UK):

(UK, colloquial) To spend time in prison or jail.


bizzie

(slang, Liverpool, derogatory) A police officer.


Okhrana

(historical) A secret police force of the Russian Empire.

Okhrana

(historical) a secret police force of the Russian Empire


by wire

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-by wire.wav


resisting arrest

(law) The crime of obstructing or opposing a police officer who is making an arrest.


prison-industrial complex

en-noun

prison–industrial complex (plural prison-industrial complexes)

prison–industrial complex (canonical)
prison-industrial complexes (plural)

By analogy to military-industrial complex. First use appears c. 1960. See cite below.

In Philadelphia, on the other hand, during a day of action against the prison-industrial complex, I saw a lot of cop cars being beaten up,

1960, New Left Review Limited (publisher), New Left Review, page 83:

[…]if we pursue the privatisation of prisons, a large industry will develop. Over the past two or three years many hon. Members have been lobbied by the private prison groups. They are already organised and are paying political consultants and lobbying companies. Some of them have paid Conservative Members—not Labour Members [to lobby for private prisons.¶The prison industrial complex already existed and Conservative Members were taking the King's shilling years ago in respect of that professional lobby.

1992 July 6, Barry Sheerman, “Prisons”, in parliamentary debates (Commons), volume 211, column 125:

[…]that while a person is incarcerated he can't commit a crime or they can't be continued wife abusers or whatever, is exactly the logic that is fueling the prison industrial complex that is going on for many decades, but has now become explosive.

1995 January, John Conyers Jr., “Taking Back Our Streets Act of 1995: Hearing Before The Subcommittee on Crime of the Committee on the Judiciary”, in hearings (House of Representatives), Washington D.C.: United States Government Publishing Office, →ISBN, page 575:

The socioeconomic combination of prisons and the private businesses that supply them with goods and services.


multimurder

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-multimurder.wav

Sergeant Vincensio Mahero once again received a call to view a multimurder scene that indicated it to be a professional execution, possibly of a political nature.


car clout

Yesterday's pleasant weather should have brought an increase in certain felonies — purse snatches, street holdups, car clouts, convenience-store stickups, ATM rips. There was no logical reason why crime should be down […]

2006, Michael A. Graham, The Snow Angel:

From there they went over the Little River Ranger Station about a mile away to complete a car clout report. The ranger was taking information on the car clout from Pam when I walked into the ranger station.

(US, colloquial) The crime of breaking into an automobile.


stovec

I think it is because if a garage get a stovec and no one claims it, they dont^([sic]) get paid, not only that, they have to pay AADL too.

2008 July 16, Chocolate boy, “Re: Heavy Recovery”, in PrisonOfficer.org.uk, retrieved 2014-10-26:

If there's a car on your drive when you get home, and you can't get onto the drive yourself, there's no obstruction as such. However, it would be worth a phone call to the police (non emergency number) as you never know, the car might be an outstanding stovec, in which case we will come, and it will be removed.

2010 March 4, Damsel, “Parked on a private driveway without permission”, in PoliceSpecials.com, archived from the original on 2014-11-22:

(UK, law enforcement) A stolen car, van, lorry or other motor vehicle.


freeboot

en-verb

freeboot (third-person singular simple present freeboots, present participle freebooting, simple past and past participle freebooted)

freeboots (present singular third-person)
freebooting (participle present)
freebooted (participle past)
freebooted (past)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-freeboot.wav


Inspector Knacker

en-noun

Inspector Knacker (plural Inspector Knackers)

Coined by Private Eye as "Knacker of the Yard", a pun on knacker's yard and the practice of referring to Scotland Yard as the Yard.

You won't be smiling when Inspector Knacker pays you a visit.

However, just before he is discharged, the French ring up Inspector Knacker and say, "Look, I'm sorry we haven't made it in time, but we absolutely promise you that we will get it to you in another 48 hours, so please arrest this man again, as soon as he is discharged".

2003 June 18, Lord Goodhart, “Official Report of the Grand Committee on the Extradition Bill”, in parliamentary debates (House of Lords), column 349:

Reid wants to be top of the cops, issuing orders to Inspector Knackers and James Bonds with criminals and terrorists in his sights.

2007 January 24, the Editor, “Secretary for Public Safety”, in The Mirror:

Please note: Inspector Knacker has been known to query applications by phone in the early hours NZ time, so forewarn your family, friends and flatmates that you are not the subject of an Interpol inquiry.

2008, Georgina Pallfey, Working and Living in New Zealand, page 129:

But, on this occasion, caution wisely stayed his hand and he confined himself to poisoning the Birdas coffee only, reasoning that wiping out an entire Conservative Party Association branch, while desirable from the point of view of most decent folk, might, unfortunately, have the countervailing disadvantage of attracting the attention of Inspector Knacker.

(UK, countable or uncountable) A generic police officer, or the police in general.


SERT

w:Special Emergency Response Team (Queensland)

(law enforcement, Australia, Queensland) Acronym of Special Emergency Response Team.

Special Emergency Response Team
w:Special Emergency Response Team

(law enforcement, Canada) Acronym of Special Emergency Response Team.


PORT

w:Victoria Police Public Order Response Team

(law enforcement in Australia) Abbreviation of Public Order Response Team.


Mossos d'Esquadra

/ˌmɒsəʊz dɪˈskwɑːdɹə/

/ˌməʊsəʊz dɪˈskwɑːdɹə/

Unadapted borrowing from Catalan Mossos d'Esquadra (literally “team officers”).

unadapted borrowing

Coordinate term: Ertzaintza

Although Puigdemont has resisted internal political pressure to now formally declare Catalan independence, he has refused to rule out the move, which would escalate tensions further and could pit the regional police force, the Mossos d’Esquadra, against the thousands of Spanish Guardia Civil and national police officers deployed in Catalonia.

2017 October 22, Sam Jones, “Catalonia weighs up declaration of independence”, in the Guardian:


LPR

en-noun

LPR (countable and uncountable, plural LPRs)

(US, law enforcement) Abbreviation of license plate recognition.


robocop

From robo- + cop, after the film RoboCop (1987).

1990, Library and Information Technology Association (U.S.). National Conference, Michael Gorman, Convergence: Proceedings of the Second National Conference...
As the World Wars were succeeded by the Korean War, which melded into the Vietnam War, science fiction pictured numerous dystopias controlled by means of ever-watchful computer and robocops.

Opposite of natural monsters there are technological monsters such as terminators, cyborgs, and robocops—all of which undermine dichotomies between the artificial and the organic, the prosthetic and the natural.

2010, Tyson E. Lewis, Richard Kahn, Education Out of Bounds, page 1:

(science fiction) A cyborg police officer.


testilying

Blend of testifying + lying. Coined by New York City police officers, appearing in print in 1994 in the report of the Mollen Commission (see 1994 quotation).

Several officers also told us that the practice of police falsification in connection with such arrests is so common in certain precincts that it has spawned its own word: “testilying.“

[1994, Commission to Investigate Allegations of Police Corruption and the Anti-Corruption Procedures of the Police Department, Committee Report, page 36:

“Testilying,” police fabricating evidence or lying in court, is a type of police corruption.

2007, Jack R. Greene, “Courtroom testimony and ‘testilying’”, in The Encyclopedia of Police Science, volume 1, page 273:

Shadow vigilantism can also be seen in the conduct of officials within the system who feel morally justified in subverting the system because they see it as regularly and indifferently producing failures of justice.[…] It’s also apparent in police “testilying” to subvert search and seizure technicalities (and judicial toleration of it) and in prosecutorial overcharging to compensate for past perceived justice failures.

2018, Paul H. Robinson, Sarah Robinson, Shadow Vigilantes: How Distrust in the Justice System Breeds a New Kind of Lawlessness: Section III. The Subversions and Perversions of Shadow Vigilantism:

(US, law, informal, euphemistic) The act of a police officer giving false testimony (perjury).


police brutality

The use of excessive, unjustified force, typically of a physical nature, but also including verbal abuse and psychological intimidation, by a police officer while carrying out, or under the cover of carrying out, law enforcement duties.

عنف الشرطة

use of excessive force by a police officer


peace officer

(US, Canada, law enforcement) A civil law enforcement officer with a duty to maintain law and order, i.e., a bylaw officer, a police officer, a sheriff, etc.


bylaw officer

(Canada) An agent of municipal law enforcement responsible for ensuring obedience to the bylaws.


sanctuary city

sanctuary city (plural sanctuary cities)

Regardless of any immediate connections Koch's directive might have had to sanctuary during the 1980s, by the time Congressional representatives were discussing the 1996 immigration reforms, New York City was coming up in policy debates as an example of a sanctuary city that should be targeted for sanctions.

2012, Randy K. Lippert, Sean Rehaag, Sanctuary Practices in International Perspective, page 227:

The president is upset with congressional leaders for slow-rolling his core campaign promise, and for failing to defund sanctuary cities in their spending bill.

2018 March 21, Elaina Plott, “Trump Vents His Anger Over Border-Wall Funding”, in The Atlantic:

Since the late 19th century, when Jane Addams established Hull-House, a social settlement that drew migrants, Chicago has seen itself as an entry point for newcomers, a sanctuary city that welcomes people from the outside.

2023 May 10, Julie Bosman, “Open-Armed Chicago Feels the Strains of a Migrant Influx”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(US, Canada) A city that allows undocumented immigrants to live and work without being arrested and deported by local authorities.


police protection

Law enforcement agency tasked to safeguard a community or a person from crime.


end of watch

The date and time at which a police officer was killed while on duty.


blood atonement

A controversial Mormon doctrine that taught that murder is so heinous that the atonement of Jesus Christ does not apply, and the perpetrator must instead have their blood shed upon the ground as a sacrificial offering.


Tucker telephone

Tucker telephone (plural Tucker telephones)

Named after the Tucker State Prison Farm, where its inventor Dr. A. E. Rollins worked.

The inmate doctor wired him up on the "Tucker Telephone" with one wire to his penis and another to his big toe.

1992, British Medical Association, quoting Case report: Tucker State Prison Farm, Tucker, Arkansas (1966), Medicine Betrayed: The Participation of Doctors in Human Rights Abuses, Zed Books, page 33:

Although they enjoined the use of the Tucker telephone and similar instruments of torture, they noted that the Department of Corrections had dismissed a number of officials implicated in past violations and had instituted new rules to govern corporal punishment.

2000 March 18, Malcolm M. Feeley with Edward L. Rubin, Judicial Policy Making and the Modern State: How the Courts Reformed America's Prisons, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 57:

A torture device for giving electric shocks, designed using parts from an old-fashioned crank telephone.


police violence

19 December 2014, Paul M Farber in The Guardian Online, Die-ins demand that we bear witness to black people's fears that they'll be next
Convened largely by black youth activists, well-attended marches against police violence in dozens of US cities are convincing displays of growing dissent – but the related acts of urgent public mourning are tools of moral indictment, not just protest. Activists are staging their own deaths because speaking out against systemic racism no longer feels like enough.


photospread

-At trial, officers who administered photospreads present positive identifications as evidence, and witnesses usually testify, too.

2018, Marc H. Bornstein, The SAGE Encyclopedia of Lifespan Human Development:

A police technique for identifying a person by having a witness select the person's photograph from a group.


people smuggling

The illegal transportation of a person or persons across an international border; human smuggling.


human smuggling

The illegal transportation of a person or persons across an international border.


rickburner

Wherever the magistrates interfere, the interference is always fatal; […] afraid of the vengeance of the rickburner, they dare not refuse (even if they wish it) allowance to the pauper.

1833, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, England and the English:


Juanita Doe

(US, law, law enforcement) A Latina who is unknown, a Jane Doe of Latin descent.


Juan Doe

(US, law, law enforcement) A Latino male who is unknown, a John Doe of Latin descent.


FGC

FGC (countable and uncountable, plural FGCs)

female genital cutting
female genital cutting#English

(uncountable) Initialism of female genital cutting.

(countable, fandom slang, video games) Initialism of fighting game community.


criminal psychology

Branch of psychology which studies the wills, thoughts, intentions and reactions of criminals.


Bow Street Runner

Bow Street Runner (plural Bow Street Runners)

They were formally affiliated with the magistrate's office in Bow Street, Westminster, London.

(colloquial, historical) A member of an early police force founded in 1742 in London, England.


en-proverb

if you can't do the time, don't do the crime

From do time (“to serve a prison sentence”).

One should not carry out an action if one is unwilling to handle the consequences.


snitch bitch

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-snitch bitch.wav

(prison slang, derogatory) A snitch; one who informs the authorities about another person.


jail cell

"Hitler's obsession with cars extended to ordering a new Mercedes from his jail cell in Landsberg prison that picked him up on his release in 1924."

2006, Royals and the Reich: The Princes von Hessen in Nazi Germany, →ISBN, page 90:

"The issue might never have been resolved had not Charles Manson himself written from his jail cell, "I tend my hand in fellowship and love to the old sonsabitches who put me here, may they rot of cancer.""

"A day after being captured outside his 5,700 square-foot Brentwood estate, football legend O.J. Simpson spent Saturday under suicide watch in a 7-by-9 foot jail cell, where he is being held without bail as prosecutors prepare to seek murder indictments from the County Grand Jury."

1999, O. J. Simpson Facts and Fictions: News Rituals in the Construction of Reality, →ISBN, page 55:

A locked room to incarcerate an inmate in prison.


prison ring

A ring worn on the finger and fashioned by hand in a prison, commonly from a celluloid item such as a toothbrush or a pen.


maximum security

Younis is now serving 30 years in maximum security.

1990 June, J. Bennett, “Mission improbable”, in Washington Monthly, volume 22, number 5, page 22:

Mike Wallace: (Voiceover) […] They were released straight out of maximum security, solitary confinement, and then dropped off at this small-town bus stop nearby.

1993 December 26, “Crime and Punishment; Building More Prisons and Jails Does Not Seem to Be the Answer to High Rate of Crime in US”, in CBS_Sixty Minutes:

While in maximum security, Glennie has been assaulted four times.

2002 August 26, Kirk Mitchell, “Stuck Inside: Fakers deemed sane are often confined by the state indefinitely”, in Denver Post, page A-01:

...and this is the maximum security level.

c. 2008, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

a prison with more restrictions designed to hold the most dangerous criminals of society; supermax.


minimum security

A facility or part of a facility with minimal restrictions, designed to hold the least dangerous criminals of society.


klopemania

(rare, archaic) A compulsion to steal; kleptomania.


bullyman

(Australian Aboriginal, slang, derogatory) A police officer.


Magdalene asylum

en-noun

Magdalene asylum (plural Magdalene asylums)

Named after Mary Magdalene, traditionally associated with prostitution and patron saint of penitent sinners.

(historical) A religious prison for prostitutes and unmarried mothers, usually as a source of forced labour.


fingertip search

fingertip search (plural fingertip searches)

Several media liaison officers placed particular emphasis on the use of photo opportunities of elements of the investigation to gain or revive press interest (fingertip searches, house-to-house visits, underwater searches and so on).

1999, Andy Feist, The effective use of the media in serious crime investigations, London: Home Office, Policing and Reducing Crime Unit, Research, Development and Statistics Directorate, →ISBN:

Police search teams led by Police Constable Franklin and Police Constable Sawyer conducted a thorough fingertip search of the common approach path of the area surrounding the body and of the area on either side of the approach path.

2004, Lord Brian Hutton, Return to an Address of the Honourable the House of Commons Dated 28th January 2004 for the Report of the Inquiry Into the Circumstances Surrounding the Death of Dr David Kelly C.M.G., The Stationery Office, →ISBN, page 87:

If the crime scene is small enough, SOCOs may carry out a fingertip search for evidence. Kneeling shoulder-to-shoulder and moving forward together, officers search the ground in front of them so that every inch of the crime scene is examined.

2007, Carey Scott, Crime Scene Detective, Dorling Kindersley Ltd, →ISBN, page 9:

(UK) A fastidious forensic search of a crime scene, usually performed by investigators crawling along the ground.