Word
red handed
Phoneticsred-hand·ed
/ˈɹɛˈdhændəd/
Definition
adj. caught while doing something wrong or illegal. You use this phrase when someone is discovered at the exact moment of their crime or mistake.
adj. caught in the act of committing an offence or doing something wrong. Typically used predicatively after verbs like 'caught' or 'find'.
Examples
“The thief was caught red-handed.”
“The accountant was caught red-handed transferring funds to his personal account during a routine audit.”
“The journalist had hoped to expose corruption through careful investigation, but the official was caught red-handed by security cameras before any story could be published.”
Examples
simple
“The thief was caught red-handed.”
contextual
“The accountant was caught red-handed transferring funds to his personal account during a routine audit.”
complex
“The journalist had hoped to expose corruption through careful investigation, but the official was caught red-handed by security cameras before any story could be published.”
Usage
Almost always used predicatively after 'caught' or 'find' — rarely appears before a noun.
Etymology
From red + handed, likening to a murderer with hands red from a victim's blood. The construction to be taken with red hand — meaning caught in the act — appears in medieval Scots law from at least the 15th century.
Sir Walter Scott supplied the pivot. In Ivanhoe (1819) he recorded taken red-handed for someone apprehended mid-crime, and the expression subsequently settled into the more common caught red-handed.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Idioms
catch red-handed — To discover or capture someone in the act of committing a crime.