house arrest

American

noun

confinement of an arrested person to their residence or to a public place, such as a hospital, instead of in a jail.

He was under house arrest until the day of his trial.

house arrest British

noun

confinement to one's own home

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

house arrest Cultural

Forcible detention in one's house rather than in a prison. House arrest is used by some nations as a way to silence political dissent without the elaborate trials and criminal proceedings that would bring bad publicity.

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

house arrests

plural

Etymology

Origin of house arrest

First recorded in 1935–40

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023