bang to rights

comparative more bang to rights · superlative most bang to rights · alternative banged to rights

1. UKidiomaticnot comparableusuallyRed-handed, (caught) in the act.

   The silk! Hide it! Throw it away! If they get us with that—we’re bang to rights.

   1919 December 2, Charles W. Tyler, “Raw Silk”, in Detective Stories Magazine, volume XXVIII, New York: Street & Smith, page 29

   2 more examples

   We had a man once who got caught with a bundle of railroad stocks. They got him bang to rights and would have shoved him, only[…] when he swore he’d found them, they couldn’t prove he hadn’t.

   1910 December, George Allan England, “The Steeled Conscience”, in The Railroad Man’s Magazine, New York: Frank A. Munsey Co., page 188

   Looking at the evidence, I’d assumed that the hapless pair was bang to rights and that we’d have little trouble placing him on remand and giving the law-abiding residents of Surrey a brief respite.

   2012, Officer ‘A’, The Crime Factory: The Shocking True Story of a Front Line CID Detective, Edinburgh: Mainstream, page 218

   Synonyms: dead to rights, blameworthily, compunctiously, dead to rights, guiltylike, guiltily, nocently, red-handedly

2. not comparableusuallyUsed other than figuratively or idiomatically: see bang (adverb), to rights.

   He wished he were in London, where a girl in a minicab would set him bang to rights.

   2008, James Buchan, The gate of air

   2 more examples

   Once, after a spammer trolled Nanae, accusing antis of having no life, Mad Pierre sarcastically responded that the spammer was correct. ¶ “Damn, you’ve got us bang to rights. We have no lives. None. At all.”

   2004, Brian S. McWilliams, Spam Kings, Sebastopol, California: O’Reilly Media, published 2005, →ISBN, page 69

   Tyler tries to dismiss Vidal's characterization of him as a pseudo-intellectual buffoon, but succeeds only in demonstrating that Vidal had him bang to rights.

   2007, Neil Pearson, Obelisk: A History of Jack Kahane and the Obelisk Press, page 479

present singular third person bangs to rights · participle present banging to rights · participle past banged to rights · past banged to rights · alternative banged to rights

1. UKidiomaticrareTo have sufficient, indisputable evidence that a person's actions are generally perceived to be wrong; to catch red-handed.

   Good week for: Cyclists, after Britain's most prolific bicycle thief was banged to rights.

   2007 May 26, The Week, 615, 6

   3 more examples

   I am as intent on banging them all to rights as the next bleeding heart middle-class liberal, but take a look at the record so far.

   2006, Planning, numbers 1650–1666, page 8

   His alter-ego Batman utters nothing more provocative than the occasional “holy smoke” as he bangs adversaries to rights

   2009 February 4, “Batman turns air blue in Terminator tantrum”, in Belfast Telegraph

   He'd been untouchable for the past decade, but now Roy Grace had finally banged him to rights.

   2010, Peter James, Dead Simple