کلمات قضایی به زبان انگلیسی

Crime and Law English Vocabulary!

Good afternoon, I’m Jim newsmen. Today’s top stories: the Prime Minister has been arrested for trespassing through a field of wheat; A Kitten in London has been jailed for murder and is awaiting trial; Dracula the fictional public domain character has been accused of robbery. He denies the charge.

This puppy from Liverpool has been sentenced to eight years in prison for tax evasion. In a public statement made by his lawyer, he said roof. And finally Hercules, famous for his impressive strength and amazing ABS, has been found guilty of drug possession and steroid use. Those stories and more coming up after today’s lesson.

If you commit a crime, then you’re a criminal and I or another police officer will arrest you, take you to jail. Then you’ll go to court for your trial, where a jury might decide the verdict. Are you guilty or innocent? If you’re found guilty, then you’ll go to prison for a long time. So like own, don’t be a criminal. It’s rubbish. It’s hot. It’s really hot.

Okay So if you do a crime we say you commit a crime. That’s the verb which collocates to crime and all of the crimes that you’ll learn today. First, let’s look at the violent crimes when someone is hurt or injured. So the word for hurting or injuring someone in general doesn’t have to be physical; it could be emotional, too. But the word is assault. You might also hear the word battery and in this case where someone is physically harmed there’s a physical injury, it’s actually both. You can say this is assault or this is battery. That’s the name of the crime. But very specifically there is a difference.

Battery is when there is physical harm. That’s true of assault. But if there is not physical damage, not a physical injury, perhaps it’s a threat, perhaps you hurt someone in another way, with words perhaps. That is a type of assault and we’re going to learn a few different types of assault in today’s lesson.

Okay, let’s say that he punches this guy and and, and without intention, he kills him. He only wanted to punch the guy he didn’t want to kill him. When you kill someone without intention or perhaps through negligence, accidentally, that has a specific name. Manslaughter, it’s not gender-specific. It’s for both male and female, manslaughter. You commit manslaughter. Remember we don’t say do Manslaughter, we don’t say do a crime, we say commit a crime. In this case, he committed, it’s a regular verb, Manslaughter.

Okay with intention. Let’s say you want to kill the person. What’s the name of that? If you want to kill someone and you kill them, the name of that crime is, commonly it’s called murder, you commit murder. It’s the name of the crime and the verb, he murdered him. Again, it’s a regular verb but in law, it’s called homicide. In a newspaper, for example. He committed homicide because it sounds more formal. In conversation if you’re talking about crimes, you would probably say, he committed murder or he murdered him.

The next crime is about a type of sexual assault, when you force someone to have sex. In Latin languages, I Believe your word is this or a variation of this. In English the nearest word is violate, but that doesn’t mean to force someone to have sex, that’s different. That crime is called rape, commit rape. So that’s the name of the crime and it’s the verb. That’s not the only word confusion with this crime. The person who commits rape is not a raper or a rapper. No, it’s Rapist, that’s the person who commits rape, who rapes.

The next crime involves setting fire to places to things. If you set fire to a place or a building or a thing, this crime is called arson. The person is an arsonist. The common mistake, I hear from students with that situation, with fire, you don’t say put fire on the house or put the house on fire, no. The verb is set, for example the sentence: the arsonist set fire to the house or he sets the building, the car on fire. Two ways of saying it.

Okay. The next group of crimes is about stealing. Taking something, which doesn’t belong to you. In general when you steal, when you take something which isn’t yours, you commit theft. The name of the person is a thief. The thief commits theft. Of course there are many different types of theft. For example if you steal something from a house, shop, a building or a person with a weapon or a gun, some kind of force, that situation is called robbery. You commit robbery. Notice in this situation, he is stealing with a weapon, with force, with a threat. So that is called robbery. He is a a robber and the verb is robbed. So a whole sentence could be, he robbed the bank. If you enter a building with the intention to steal something, this one is called burglary and the person who does it is called a burglar. The verb for this is, to burgle, which is a very fun word to say, but definitely don’t do it. It’s bad.

Our next crime happens in the street, in a usually a public place. When she wants to steal his money, his phone and she has a knife, this verb is called, to mug. She is mugging him. The name of the crime is mugging. She committed a mugging and maybe you’ve guessed it the name of the person who does it is a Mugger. Quick differences between these three. For example you wake up in the morning, your TV is missing. You were burgled, someone burgled your house. Someone enters your house and they have a gun and say give me your TV. You were robbed. So yet this could be, he was robbed, she robbed him, it could be. But more specifically in a public place, in the street, this is called a mugging. She mugged him. He was mugged, in the passive. Try to practice these with your own examples in the comments.

So the next thing is maybe a more common crime that probably you’ve done, be honest. When you steal something from a shop whether it’s candy or a t-shirt or anything from a shop, that is called, Shoplifting and the person is called a Shoplifter. The verb may be you’ve guessed it, is to shoplift. It’s a regular verb, shoplifted, in the past. Question for you in the comments be honest, I won’t tell the police. Have you ever shoplifted, you can be honest. You can tell me. It’s just you and me here. Tell me in the comments. What did you shoplift? The next few crimes are about stealing a vehicle, taking control of a vehicle from someone else. When you steal a car, when you take control of that car from someone else, the crime is Carjacking. When it’s a plane, it’s hijacking. The verb is to hijack or carjack. The person who commits that crime is a Carjacker or a hijacker and again, remember all of these crimes you would say you commit the crime not do the crime. For example this Person committed a hijacking, not did a hijacking.

If someone steals a person that crime is called Kidnap and that’s also the verb. The person who commits the kidnapping is called the kidnapper. You might read or hear the expression White-collar crime. There’s a TV show called white collar. What are white collar crimes? Let’s have a look. The first example of a white collar crime is embezzlement. This is when you steal money, which is in your care. For example you steal money from your company. That’s embezzlement. The verb is to embezzle, again a fun word to say. And the person is an embezzler. True story, I used to teach a guy who’s now in prison for embezzlement.

Now taxes are annoying, but you need to pay them. If you don’t pay your taxes, that’s called Tax evasion. That’s the name of the crime. The person who commits tax evasion is called a tax evader. The verb, we would say this person evaded tax or of course Committed tax evasion.

The next one is about lying in order to get money. You know those emails you sometimes get, where they write, hey my uncle just died, he was a millionaire and I can share that money with you if you first send me like a hundred dollars or whatever. Of course this person is never going to pay you. This is a crime. This crime is called fraud. That’s also the name of the person who commits fraud. You could say this person is a fraud. This email is a fraud. But fraud is not just for those emails, it’s for anyone who lies or deceive someone in order to gain something financially or personally.

A policeman stops you, says you have committed a crime and you say, maybe just ignore the crime and I’ll give you money. This crime is called Bribery. The verb is to bribe. Now there’s no one word for this person who commits bribery. We don’t have a word for that. So an example sentence: he bribed the policeman. Also you should know that bribe is the verb and the noun. So this money is a bribe. You could say, he offered him a bribe, for example, or he took the bribe or he refused the bribe. There’s bribery happen in your city? Let me know. I mean if you’ve done it, don’t, probably don’t write it in the comments, but does it happen? Let me know in the comments.

Let’s imagine you know someone’s secret and you tell them: I Want to tell everyone but I won’t say anything if you pay me lots of money. What’s that called? It’s called blackmail. That is also a verb. So you can commit blackmail and the person who does it is a Blackmailer. So an example sentence could be: he blackmailed him 4 million pounds to keep his secret.

Okay, you know how the Mafia will tell someone who maybe owns a shop: pay us protection money and nothing bad will happen to your shop. This is a crime and this is called Extortion. When you take money from someone, usually through force or a threat. So ya think the Mafia, that’s what they do. The verb is To extort. So the Mafia is extorting this guy. I know there’s a lot of vocabulary here but remember the best way to learn the vocabulary is by writing it down, making your own examples, examples which you can easily remember. So make the examples funny or crazy or silly. They’re easier to remember than the boring ones.

So those are big crimes. What about the small crimes? The small crimes in which you might have to pay some money or spend a day or two in jail, those are called Misdemeanors. Those are the smaller crimes. You might just have to pay a little money, a fine. If You break damage or destroy someone else’s property, that is called Vandalism. The verb is To vandalize and the person who does it is A vandal. So a common argument, a common debate is, is graffiti,Vandalism or art. Are they vandals or artists? What do you think? Let me know in the comments.

Living in London can be quite expensive so my other job selling sex. This is called Prostitution. The person who does it is a Prostitute. You sometimes hear it more informally as, a Hooker, in TV shows and movies most commonly and again, that’s a person who sells sex.

If you enter someone’s property or a restricted area without permission, this crime is called Trespassing and trespass, that’s the verb. You probably know that the person is called a Trespasser. So yeah, true story, our prime minister said the naughtiest thing she’s ever done was trespassing. She ran through fields of wheat when she was young. She’s so annoying.

When a person commits a crime a police officer will put handcuffs on that person. That verb is to arrest. The police officer arrests the criminal. Later that criminal will go to a building where they have to argue that they didn’t do anything wrong, they didn’t commit a crime. This guy is saying you committed a crime. You did it so you are Guilty. If you’re guilty, you did the crime. But you want to say no, I didn’t do this crime. I am, I’m innocent. I didn’t commit any crime. I didn’t do anything wrong. These guys will hear your story the other side of the story. They are called the jury. They will make the decision whether you’re guilty or innocent. And also this person will make a decision on whether you’re guilty or innocent. This person controls the court. They are the judge. We have a word for the decision that is made. The decision of guilty or innocent is, the verdict. That’s the decision and they don’t say we Decided you’re guilty or innocent. They say we find you guilty or innocent. So for example a sentence could be: he was found guilty of robbery. Now, what’s the punishment? We can talk about the punishment with the word sentence. Sentence is a verb and a noun. So an example sentence could be: and he was sentenced to eight years. Thank you for watching.