Okuzeka
Criminal Law & Justice vocabulary · Evidence & Forensics

Witness

Meaning in criminal law & justice, with examples

/ˈwɪtnəs/nounCore term

In criminal law & justice, witness means: A person who saw or heard something connected with a crime, or who gives information about it in court.

In Turkish: tanık, şahit

How it is used

Police 'appeal for witnesses' after an incident; lawyers 'call' and 'question' witnesses at trial. An 'eyewitness' saw the event directly; an 'expert witness' gives a professional opinion. It is also a verb: 'Did anyone witness the attack?'

Example sentences

  1. Police are appealing for witnesses who were near the station at about 10 pm.

  2. The defence called two witnesses who said he was at work that evening.

  3. She witnessed the robbery from her shop window.

Common collocations

  • key witness
  • eyewitness
  • expert witness
  • call a witness
  • appeal for witnesses
  • testifyTo make a formal statement in court about what you know or saw, usually after promising to tell the truth.
  • evidenceInformation, objects, documents or testimony that a court can use to decide whether something is true, for example whether the defendant committed the crime.
  • statementA written or recorded account of what a person saw, heard or did, given formally to the police or a court.
  • perjuryThe crime of deliberately telling a lie in court or in another official statement after promising to tell the truth.
  • alibiEvidence or a claim that a person was somewhere else when the crime happened, so they could not have committed it.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Evidence & Forensics

Practise with graded reading

Reading at the right level is the fastest way to make new words stick. Pick free English books by level:

This page explains English vocabulary for learners. It is not legal advice.