testilie

English

Etymology

Blend of testify +‎ lie. Possibly a back-formation from the noun testilying, which appeared a few years earlier and is more common.

Verb

testilie (third-person singular simple present testilies, present participle testilying, simple past and past participle testilied)

1. (US, law, informal, euphemistic) To commit perjury (as a police officer).
   • 1999 January, Larry Cunningham, “Taking on Testilying”, in Criminal Justice Ethics, volume 18, →DOI, pages 26–40:

     In Manhattan, grand jury prosecutors are urged to interview police officers separately if there is any possibility they may be fabricating evidence or about to testilie.

   • 2007, Jack R. Greene, “Courtroom testimony and ‘testilying’”, in The Encyclopedia of Police Science‎, volume 1, page 274:

     Higher rank officers in New York advocated that those officers who testilied should not be prosecuted because testilying was a police tradition.

Anagrams

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