crime passionnel

British

/ krim pɑsjɔnɛl /

noun

Also called: crime of passion. a crime committed from passion, esp sexual passion

"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

Etymology

Origin of crime passionnel

from French

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

And in Scenario C, I wouldn't remember anything and I probably wouldn't even have to go to prison because it would have been what the French call a crime passionnel.

From The Guardian

The survivor's instinct could only have deepened as he saw his family cut down by firing squad and assassin: his younger brother Maximilian as Napoleon Ill's cat's paw in Mexico, his son Rudolf as a result of a crime passionnel suicide pact at Mayerling, his wife at Geneva, his nephew Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo.

From Time Magazine Archive

Crime Does Not Pay is a film-within-a-film excursion into crime passionnel that pays off almost too generously with blood, plot and stars.

From Time Magazine Archive

Chicago had its quick rub-out with the .45 slug rubbed in garlic, New York its cement-festooned body in the East River, Paris its crime passionnel.

From Time Magazine Archive

Washington matrons avidly devoured each minute detail of this love-after-40 crime passionnel.

From Time Magazine Archive

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