get away with murder

present singular third person gets away with murder · participle present getting away with murder · past got away with murder · UK participle past got away with murder · US participle past gotten away with murder

1. excessiveTo do something bad or illegal and escape the punishment that others would receive.

   It's because you let people get away with murder, Quill.

   2000, Claudia Bishop, Marinade for Murder, Berkley, →ISBN

   4 more examples

   Just yesterday it was fashionable to be black. Remember? Any black writer could get away with murder, just as any Jewish-American writer can get away with murder.

   1980, Gore Vidal, Robert J. Stanton, Views from a Window: Conversations with Gore Vidal, L. Stuart, →ISBN, page 245

   He'd spoil the boy just as we have all spoiled him, and though he's a big strapping fellow and a soldier at that, he'd let Ned get away with murder just as I've done.

   1984, James Purdy, On Glory's Course, Viking Press, →ISBN, page 147

   He said I found out about everything he did and said, 'I can't get away with nothing, and Jim can get away with murder.' I don't think that I let any of my kids get away with murder, and I don't think any one of them ever did much serious mischief.

   2005, James M. Hill, Sr., I Have Been Blessed!: Hard Work and Happiness, Aforesight Press, →ISBN, page 205

   And what do you say to someone who might be on the left, who’d be listening to this conversation and would say: Oh look, Bannon is absolutely right. There was a financial crisis. Wall Street got away with murder.

   2025 January 31, Ross Douthat, “Steve Bannon on ‘Broligarchs’ vs. Populism”, in The New York Times, →ISSN