Frontier justice is
extrajudicial punishment
Extrajudicial punishment is a punishment for an alleged crime or offense which is carried out without legal process or supervision by a court or tribunal through a legal proceeding.
Politically motivated
Extrajudicial punishment is often a fea ...
that is motivated by the nonexistence of
law and order or dissatisfaction with
justice
Justice, in its broadest sense, is the principle that people receive that which they deserve, with the interpretation of what then constitutes "deserving" being impacted upon by numerous fields, with many differing viewpoints and perspective ...
.
The phrase can also be used to describe a prejudiced
judge
A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...
.
Lynching
Lynching is an extrajudicial killing by a group. It is most often used to characterize informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged transgressor, punish a convicted transgressor, or intimidate people. It can also be an ex ...
,
vigilantism
Vigilantism () is the act of preventing, investigating and punishing perceived offenses and crimes without legal authority.
A vigilante (from Spanish, Italian and Portuguese “vigilante”, which means "sentinel" or "watcher") is a person who ...
and
gunfighting
A shootout, also called a firefight or gunfight, is a fight between armed combatants using firearms. The term can be used to describe any such fight, though it is typically used to describe those that do not involve military forces or only invo ...
are considered forms of frontier justice.
Examples
United States
* March 20 to April 15, 1882:
Wyatt Earp
Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp (March 19, 1848 – January 13, 1929) was an American lawman and gambler in the American West, including Dodge City, Deadwood, and Tombstone. Earp took part in the famous gunfight at the O.K. Corral, during which la ...
and
Doc Holliday
John Henry Holliday (August 14, 1851 – November 8, 1887), better known as Doc Holliday, was an American Old West, American gambling, gambler, gunfighter, and dentistry, dentist. A close friend and associate of Sheriff, lawman Wyatt Earp, H ...
tracked and killed 4 cowboys said to be responsible for
Morgan Earp
Morgan Seth Earp (April 24, 1851 – March 18, 1882) was an American sheriff and Marshal, lawman. He served as Tombstone, Arizona, Tombstone, Arizona Territory, Arizona's Special Policeman when he helped his brothers Virgil Earp, Virgil and Wy ...
's death, which would later become known as the
Earp Vendetta Ride
The Earp Vendetta Ride was a deadly search by a federal posse led by Deputy U.S. Marshal Wyatt Earp for a loose confederation of outlaw " Cowboys" they believed had ambushed his brothers Virgil and Morgan Earp, maiming the former and killing ...
.
* Late 1800s: A group of self-appointed
lawmen called "stranglers" lynched around sixty
horse rustlers and
cattle rustlers along southwest
North Dakota
North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the indigenous Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north and by the U.S. states of Minnesota to the east, ...
's
Little Missouri River.
Brazil
* April 1991: José Vicente Anunciação
murder
Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. ("The killing of another person without justification or excuse, especially the ...
ed a co-worker during a drunken knife-fight in
Salvador, Bahia
Salvador (English: ''Savior'') is a Brazilian municipality and capital city of the state of Bahia. Situated in the Zona da Mata in the Northeast Region of Brazil, Salvador is recognized throughout the country and internationally for its cuisi ...
. Witnesses to the crime were not able to provide evidence in court. Anunciação was set free and then dragged from his bed at night by a mob of forty people who beat him to death with bricks and clubs. Previously, a mob of 1,500 people stormed and set fire to the
Paraná prison where Valdecir Ferreira and Altair Gomes were being held for the murder of a taxi-cab driver.
India
* “At 3pm on August 13 2004, Akku Yadav was lynched by a mob of around 200 women from Kasturba Nagar. It took them 15 minutes to hack to death the man they say raped them with impunity for more than a decade. Chilli powder was thrown in his face and stones hurled. As he flailed and fought, one of his alleged victims hacked off his penis with a vegetable knife. A further 70 stab wounds were left on his body. The incident was made all the more extraordinary by its setting. Yadav was murdered not in the dark alleys of the slum, but on the shiny white marble floor of Nagpur district court.” https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/sep/16/india.gender
See also
*
Citizen's arrest
A citizen's arrest is an arrest made by a private citizen – that is, a person who is not acting as a sworn law-enforcement official. In common law jurisdictions, the practice dates back to medieval England and the English common law, in which ...
*
Feud
A feud , referred to in more extreme cases as a blood feud, vendetta, faida, clan war, gang war, or private war, is a long-running argument or fight, often between social groups of people, especially families or clans. Feuds begin because one par ...
*
Gjakmarrja
In the traditional Albanian culture, (English: "blood-taking", i.e. "blood feud") or ("revenge") is the social obligation to kill an offender or a member of their family in order to salvage one's honor. This practice is generally seen as in line ...
*
Jungle law
"The law of the jungle" (also called jungle law) is an expression that has come to describe a scenario where "anything goes". The '' Oxford English Dictionary'' defines the Law of the Jungle as "''the code of survival in jungle life'', now usua ...
*
List of feuds in the United States
Feuds in the United States deals with the phenomena of historic blood feuding in the United States. These feuds have been numerous and some became quite vicious. Often, a conflict which may have started out as a rivalry between two individuals ...
*
Noble cause corruption Noble cause corruption is corruption caused by the adherence to a teleological ethical system, suggesting that people will use unethical or illegal means to attain desirable goals, a result which appears to benefit the greater good. Where tradition ...
*
Ochlocracy
Mob rule or ochlocracy ( el, ὀχλοκρατία, translit=okhlokratía; la, ochlocratia) is the rule of government by a mob or mass of people and the intimidation of legitimate authorities. Insofar as it represents a pejorative for majorit ...
*
Range war
A range war or range conflict is a type of usually violent conflict, most commonly in the 19th and early 20th centuries in the American West. The subject of these conflicts was control of " open range", or range land freely used for cattle grazing ...
*
Rough music
*
Vigilante
Vigilantism () is the act of preventing, investigating and punishing perceived offenses and crimes without legal authority.
A vigilante (from Spanish, Italian and Portuguese “vigilante”, which means "sentinel" or "watcher") is a person who ...
*
Hanging of Patrick O'Connor
*
Witch-hunt
A witch-hunt, or a witch purge, is a search for people who have been labeled witches or a search for evidence of witchcraft. The classical period of witch-hunts in Early Modern Europe and Colonial America took place in the Early Modern pe ...
References
Capital punishment
Criminal law
Human rights abuses
Extrajudicial killings
Vigilantism
Vigilantism in the United States
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