overprosecute

present singular third person overprosecutes · participle present overprosecuting · participle past overprosecuted · past overprosecuted

1. transitiveTo prosecute (a crime or community) excessively.

   The emphasis on prosecution and conviction as metrics of success leads police and prosecutors to overarrest, overprosecute, and overpunish low-level drug and other crimes in many cases.

   2017, Sharon Dolovich, Alexandra Natapoff, The New Criminal Justice Thinking, page 61

   1 more example

   Criminal justice reform has become a national topic of discussion given recent police killings of Black men, and Jones points out that he's been a longtime activist on this issue, with his experience in Palo Alto and as an NAACP youth organizer. Also, he notes, as a Black man, "People like me are overpoliced, overarrested, overprosecuted."

   2020 June 22, Trudy Ring, “Mondaire Jones Could Be the Nation's First Black Gay Congressman”, in The Advocate, archived from the original on 15 Aug 2021