Learn English – a word for a punishment given by people without proper trial instead of the court

single-word-requests

Is there a word that describes the giving of punishment (usually stoned to death) of a criminal by the local people near where the crime happened?

A typical example would be when a thief in a village steals a motorcycle, and then gets caught by the angry mobs, and then usually the thief gets either killed by the mobs or beaten badly without proper hearing and trial, usually until the police intervene.

I've tried searching for "trial by the mass" (but apparently Google found mass trial instead), "public trial" (but apparently it means something different), "trial without hearing" (but the results are not what I'm looking for), "punishment by the mass" (but Google found capital punishment and collective punishment instead), and so far, nothing gives me a word for punishment by the public/mass.

Best Answer

From Merriam-Webster Online:

Lynch

transitive verb : to put to death (as by hanging) by mob action without legal sanction

From Online Etymology:

lynch (v.)

1835, from earlier Lynch law (1811), likely named after William Lynch (1742-1820) of Pittsylvania, Virginia, who c.1780 led a vigilance committee to keep order there during the Revolution. Other sources trace the name to Charles Lynch (1736-1796) a Virginia magistrate who fined and imprisoned Tories in his district c.1782, but the connection to him is less likely. Originally any sort of summary justice, especially by flogging; narrowing of focus to "extralegal execution by hanging" is 20c. Lynch mob is attested from 1838. The surname is perhaps from Irish Loingseach "sailor." Compare earlier Lydford law, from a place in Dartmoor, England, "where was held a Stannaries Court of summary jurisdiction" [Weekley], hence:

Lydford law: is to hang men first, and indite them afterwards. [Thomas Blount, "Glossographia," 1656]

(Which I find interesting—I'd always assumed lynch was related to the actual noose somehow.)

Google Ngram purports to find a reference to "lynch law" going back to 1790, but that is suspicious. The terms really start to heat up about 1830.

And an article I was just reading in Scientific American reminded me that murder is also a perfectly appropriate term for the taking of life extralegally.

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