Question of the Day #1192

The Justice Department (DoJ) has them dead to rights and they will be going away for a long, long time.

From the 7th paragraph of this article at Disruption Banking.

  上記の文で、dead to rightsの意味は？
In the sentence above, what does "dead to rights" mean?

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明日、ここに答えを書きます。
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解答

意味：
英辞郎によると、

〈米話〉〔犯人逮捕などが〕現行犯で、現場で

下記英語の定義にあるように、この場合の"to rights"は「直ちに・すぐに」の意味です。

 

Answer

According to Dictionary.com:

In the act of committing an error or crime, red-handed...This phrase uses to rights in the sense of “at once.”

 

Examples

1. They caught the burglars dead to rights with the Oriental rugs.
2. Even if a kid is caught dead to rights with alcohol, we can't punish him.
3. Because of the video replay, the ref had him dead to rights on the penalty.
4. They finally caught the thief dead to rights with thousands of dollars in stolen goods.
5. The politician was caught dead to rights in a massive corruption scandal that tanked his career.

   

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