Alford plea means: A plea in criminal court in which the defendant does not admit guilt but concedes the government has sufficient evidence to convict.. It is legal vocabulary; usage is usually formal, institutional, or news-related rather than casual teen talk. There is no real cause for parental concern; it is descriptive vocabulary rather than risky behaviour. If your teen uses it, context will usually make the intent clear. A short, curious question about where they heard it is usually all that is needed to know whether to follow up.
Alford plea
(US, legal) A plea in criminal court in which the defendant does not admit guilt but concedes the government has sufficient evidence to convict.
Etymology timeline
Born ~1970 · no dated citations yetDefinitions
(US, legal) A plea in criminal court in which the defendant does not admit guilt but concedes the government has sufficient evidence to convict.
Alford plea means: A plea in criminal court in which the defendant does not admit guilt but concedes the government has sufficient evidence to convict.. It is legal vocabulary; usage is usually formal, institutional, or news-related rather than casual teen talk. There is no real cause for parental concern; it is descriptive vocabulary rather than risky behaviour. If your teen uses it, context will usually make the intent clear. A short, curious question about where they heard it is usually all that is needed to know whether to follow up.
Alford plea means: A plea in criminal court in which the defendant does not admit guilt but concedes the government has sufficient evidence to convict.. Register: formal, legal English. Standard in its technical domain but rare in everyday talk; gloss with a plain synonym when writing for a general audience. A common learner mistake is using the word in a register it does not fit, or assuming a single global meaning; native speakers immediately notice when slang appears in formal contexts, so always check the surrounding register before producing it yourself.
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Why is this section here?
Slang is read by different audiences for very different reasons. The For parents view re-explains the term in plain, non-judgemental language so a caregiver can understand what their child means without needing the surrounding subculture. The For English learners view focuses on register (when it's safe to use), formal alternatives, and common mistakes — what a textbook won't teach you.
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Semantically related
- 77%
(US, legal) The doctrine allowing the use of the Alford plea.
- 73%
(US, legal) A plea in criminal court in which the defendant does not admit guilt, but concedes that the state has sufficient evidence to obtain a conviction.
- 67%
(US, legal) An agreement in which a defendant agrees to plead guilty to a lesser charge instead of not guilty to a greater one.
- 66%
(US, law) A type of plea in a criminal proceeding where the defendant neither admits nor denies guilt but consents to the imposition of punishment as if guilty.
- 63%
(slang, legal) To plead guilty to a lesser criminal charge than one had been charged with.