The Meaning of the Word Suspect

Suspect () is an informal way to refer to a person who is suspected of something. Suspect may also be used to refer to a person, animal, or thing that is generally associated with a particular activity, situation, or object: ‘That bad-smelling piece of fish is suspect’; ‘the usual suspects’, the people that are usually present in an area.

The verb suspect has 13 meanings listed in the OED, six of which are labelled obsolete. See ‘Meaning & use’ for further information.

To suspect is to imply that someone or something is guilty of a crime, an error, or some other irregularity. The word is most often used in reference to criminals, but it can also be applied to a person who is generally associated with a particular activity or circumstance: ‘the usual suspects’, the children who always turn up to school late.

The suspect’s response to the police officer’s formulation in line 9 – ‘it is a shame, yes, I know it was illegal’ – marks a’repetitional rephrasing’ of the police officer’s original question, and therefore operates as an upgraded form of confirmation that commits more explicitly to her suggested interpretation of his earlier answer and assumes a stronger epistemic stance. This, in turn, has implications for how we understand the suspect’s assessment of his actions and a corresponding evaluation of his mens rea. (cf. Heritage and Raymond, 2012: 186).