Home › Law for Everybody › Dictionary of Law Terms: Arrest

Dictionary of Law Terms: Arrest

Arrest. A legal seizure, capture, or taking of a man's person which is effected by corporeal touching, or something equivalent thereto. In civil cases a man can only be arrested under legal process. The officer cannot break open a man's outer door for the purpose of arresting him; nor can arrest on a civil process be effected on a Sunday, except after an escape.

Arrest of Judgment. Where the court stays a judgment, after a verdict, on some question of law.

Arson. Felonious. house-burning.

Articled Clerk. A student bound by deed to serve an attorney preparatory to his own admission to practice in England.

Articles of the Peace. A complaint against a person to compel him to find sureties tc keep the peace.

Assault and Battery. An attempt or offer, with force and violence, to do a corporal hurt to another is an assault; an injury actually done to the person of another in an angry, revengeful, or insolent manner, be it ever so small, is a battery. Assignee. A person to whom any real or personal property is transferred by the act of law, as an executor, an assignee of a bankrupt, etc., or by the act of party, as a purchaser of a lease.

Assumpsit. A promise expressed or implied, to perform a parol agreement, springing out of a simple contract. The law always implies a promise to do that which a party is legally bound to perform. An action of assumpsit or promise is the remedy for breach of a parol as distinguished from a special contract or writing under seal.

Assurance. The securing the payment of a sum of money or other benefit on the happening of a certain event, as, for instance, the death of a person. This is the : 857 term now usually applied to life contingencies, as distinguished from fires, losses at sea, etc., as to which the term insurance is still used. Attachment. A process of the Courts of Law and Equity for compelling by arrest the performance of an act, which a party is already in contempt for not performing. Also an ancient remedy to attach the money or goods of the debtor in the hands of a third party. Garnishment.

Attorney, A person appointed by another by letter or power of attorney to do anything for him in his absence. Attorney-at-Law. An officer of the superior courts of law, legally authorized to transact the business of other persons-termed his clients in those courts. Attornment. An acknowledgment by one person that he holds lands, or is the tenant, of another, thereby creating between them the relation of landlord and tenant.

Autre Droit. When a person holds an estate not in his own right, but in right of another.

Average. A contribution to a general loss. When, for the satety of a ship in distress, any destruction of property is incurred, all persons having goods on board contribute ratably to the loss; this is called average. Award. The judgment or decision of an arbitrator.

Backing a Warrant. The indorsement by a justice of the peace of the county where a warrant (which has been granted by the justice of the peace of another county) is about to be executed, and is a necessary act to be done before a person can be apprehended in a county different to that in which the warrant was issued.