Robbery \Rob"ber*y\, n.; pl. Robberies. [OF. roberie.]
   1. The act or practice of robbing; theft.
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            Thieves for their robbery have authority
            When judges steal themselves.         --Shak.
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   2. (Law) The crime of robbing. See Rob, v. t., 2.
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   Note: Robbery, in a strict sense, differs from theft, as it
         is effected by force or intimidation, whereas theft is
         committed by stealth, or privately.
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   Syn: Theft; depredation; spoliation; despoliation;
        despoilment; plunder; pillage; rapine; larceny;
        freebooting; piracy.
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	robbery
    n 1: larceny by threat of violence
    2: plundering during riots or in wartime [syn: looting,
       robbery]

	

	77 Moby Thesaurus words for "robbery":
   armed robbery, asportation, assault and robbery, banditry,
   bank robbery, bereavement, breaking and entering, burglary,
   burgling, caper, cattle lifting, cattle stealing, cost, damage,
   dead loss, debit, denial, denudation, depredation, deprivation,
   despoilment, destruction, detriment, dispossession, divestment,
   expense, extortion, filch, forfeit, forfeiture, grab, heist,
   highway robbery, hijack, hijacking, hold-up, holdup, injury, job,
   larceny, lift, looting, loser, losing, losing streak, loss,
   mugging, perdition, pilferage, pilfering, pillage, pillaging,
   pinch, pinching, plunder, plundering, pocket picking, privation,
   purse snatching, ransacking, rip-off, robbing, ruin, sack, sacking,
   sacrifice, spoliation, steal, stealing, stickup, stickup job,
   stripping, taking away, theft, thievery, thieving, total loss

	

	Robbery
   Practised by the Ishmaelites (Gen. 16:12), the Chaldeans and
   Sabeans (Job 1:15, 17), and the men of Shechem (Judg. 9:25. See
   also 1 Sam. 27:6-10; 30; Hos. 4:2; 6:9). Robbers infested Judea
   in our Lord's time (Luke 10:30; John 18:40; Acts 5:36, 37;
   21:38; 2 Cor. 11:26). The words of the Authorized Version,
   "counted it not robbery to be equal," etc. (Phil. 2:6, 7), are
   better rendered in the Revised Version, "counted it not a prize
   to be on an equality," etc., i.e., "did not look upon equality
   with God as a prize which must not slip from his grasp" = "did
   not cling with avidity to the prerogatives of his divine
   majesty; did not ambitiously display his equality with God."
   
     "Robbers of churches" should be rendered, as in the Revised
   Version, "of temples." In the temple at Ephesus there was a
   great treasure-chamber, and as all that was laid up there was
   under the guardianship of the goddess Diana, to steal from such
   a place would be sacrilege (Acts 19:37).

	

	ROBBERY, crimes. The felonious and forcible taking from the person of 
another, goods or money to any value, by violence or putting him in fear. 4 
Bl. Com. 243 1 Bald. 102. 
     2. By "taking from the person" is meant not only the immediate taking 
from his person, but also from his presence when it is done with violence 
and against his consent. 1 Hale, P. C. 533; 2 Russ. Crimes, 61. The taking 
must be by violence or putting the owner in fear, but both these 
circumstances need not concur, for if a man should be knocked down and then 
robbed while be is insensible, the offence is still a robbery. 4 Binn. R. 
379. And if the party be put in fear by threats and then robbed, it is not 
necessary there should be any greater violence. 
     3. This offence differs from a larceny from the person in this, that in 
the latter, there is no violence, while in the former the crime is 
incomplete without an actual or constructive force. Id. Vide 2 Swift's Dig. 
298. Prin. Pen. Law, ch. 22, Sec. 4, p. 285; and Carrying away; Invito 
Domino; Larceny; Taking.