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throw the book at someone

Cultural  

  1. To make as many charges as possible against an offender: “You may have gotten off lightly in the past, Benny, but this time we're going to throw the book at you.”

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

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

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