as in criminal
a person who has committed a crime
juvenile offenders have their criminal records sealed when they turn 18
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of offender
Boardman imposed a sentence of 97 months, citing Roske’s mental health and concerns about incarceration conditions and his status as a first-time criminal offender.
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Kaelan Deese, The Washington Examiner, 8 Jan. 2026
Since 2013, the law has allowed juvenile offenders serving life without parole to petition to have their sentence recalled and to be resentenced.
—Teri Figueroa, San Diego Union-Tribune, 7 Jan. 2026
Williams was able to petition for resentencing due to a law enacted in 2011 that allowed judges to give juvenile offenders with life without parole sentences a chance to be resentenced.
—CBS News, 7 Jan. 2026
The worst offenders, though, are the goody bags.
—Mandy Len Catron, The Atlantic, 7 Jan. 2026
Murrill’s office also invoked the habitual offenders statute, where criminal defendants can be tagged as habitual offenders after a fourth felony charge, according to Louisiana law, and face longer prison sentences.
—Pj Green, Kansas City Star, 7 Jan. 2026
This doesn’t mean that day-care fraud has not taken place in Minneapolis—there’s a years-long history of such malfeasance, and both state and federal law enforcement have convicted dozens of offenders, as Kash Patel subsequently pointed out.
—Jay Caspian Kang, New Yorker, 6 Jan. 2026
Under those changes, certain low-level, nonviolent drug offenders could receive a break in sentencing.
—Kevin Krause, Dallas Morning News, 6 Jan. 2026
Rantz said that when arrests are not followed by prosecution, the message to offenders is that public drug use carries few real consequences.
—Stepheny Price, FOXNews.com, 6 Jan. 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for offender
Noun
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The first thing to do is to reduce the damage to the United States, the inflow of guns and criminals and immigrants and drugs into the United States, the destabilizing of a key part of the Western Hemisphere.—
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Also, place freezes with ChexSystems and the National Consumer Telecom and Utilities Exchange to stop criminals from opening bank accounts, phone lines, or utility services in his name.—
Noun
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These awareness campaigns, which no doubt helped produce the soaring number of screenings, have a main cancer-causing culprit in mind.—
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The illusion of a dream wedding can also be a culprit.—
Cite this Entry
“Offender.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/offender. Accessed 13 Jan. 2026.
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