Sunday, March 20, 2011

Mopery

Probable Cause?

This is a new one for me: Mopery.

Mopery is a vague, informal, and usually humorous name for minor offenses. The word is based on the verb to mope, which originally meant “to wander aimlessly”; it only later acquired the overtones of “bored and depressed”. The word mope appears to have first been used in the 16th century, and appears in Shakespeare's works.

It has been used in certain jurisdictions as a legal term to mean (for example) “walking down the street with no clear destination or purpose”. Like loitering and vagrancy laws, mopery is sometimes used by law enforcement to detain individuals seen as “unsavoury”, as the police believe they have prevented them from committing a clearer or more dangerous crime.