lynching
n. C / Un. the act of a group of people killing someone without a legal trial. It is a violent crime often used to scare or control a specific group of people.
n. the extrajudicial execution of an individual by a mob, typically carried out to maintain social control or intimidate a minority group. Often involves hanging and is historically associated with racial violence.
The museum documents the history of lynching in the region.
The historian explained how lynching was used as a tool of terror to prevent people from voting.
Scholars argue that lynching represented a complete breakdown of the rule of law, where communal violence replaced formal judicial proceedings to enforce informal social hierarchies.
From lynch + -ing, see lynch.
Uncountable when referring to the practice in general; countable when referring to specific historical incidents.