The Collaborative International Dictionary
Crime \Crime\ (kr[imac]m), n. [F. crime, fr. L. crimen judicial decision, that which is subjected to such a decision, charge, fault, crime, fr. the root of cernere to decide judicially. See Certain.]
Any violation of law, either divine or human; an omission of a duty commanded, or the commission of an act forbidden by law.
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Gross violation of human law, in distinction from a misdemeanor or trespass, or other slight offense. Hence, also, any aggravated offense against morality or the public welfare; any outrage or great wrong. ``To part error from crime.''
--Tennyson.Note: Crimes, in the English common law, are grave offenses which were originally capitally punished (murder, rape, robbery, arson, burglary, and larceny), as distinguished from misdemeanors, which are offenses of a lighter grade. See Misdemeanors.
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Any great wickedness or sin; iniquity.
No crime was thine, if 'tis no crime to love.
--Pope. -
That which occasion crime. [Obs.]
The tree of life, the crime of our first father's fall.
--Spenser.Capital crime, a crime punishable with death.
Syn: Sin; vice; iniquity; wrong.
Usage: Crime, Sin, Vice. Sin is the generic term, embracing wickedness of every kind, but specifically denoting an offense as committed against God. Crime is strictly a violation of law either human or divine; but in present usage the term is commonly applied to actions contrary to the laws of the State. Vice is more distinctively that which springs from the inordinate indulgence of the natural appetites, which are in themselves innocent. Thus intemperance, unchastity, duplicity, etc., are vices; while murder, forgery, etc., which spring from the indulgence of selfish passions, are crimes.
Wiktionary
n. (context legal English) A crime that is punishable by death.
Usage examples of "capital crime".
Have I arrived at the moment when you were drawing up an indictment for a capital crime?
When a man, accused of a capital crime, chooses to undergo the ordeal trial, he is closely confined for several days.
But to liberalize anything was a major undertaking, because any liberalization of any rule might be seen as a theological error--this in a country where apostasy was a capital crime.
Further, murder attending piracy is, as I have stated, a capital crime.
This is a general court-martial, involving a capital crime, a very complex case.
For a Vor lord to possess a private military force was high treason, illegal as hell, a capital crime.
According to the White Council's Seven Laws of Magic, that's a capital crime—.