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Meaning & use

codefendent

noun·Advancedlegal

Last updated

UK/ˌkəʊ.dɪˈfen.dənt/
US/ˌkoʊ.dɪˈfen.dənt/

Meanings

  1. nouncountablelegal

    A person or company accused in the same court case as another person or company.

    Grammar: Countable: say 'a codefendant' or 'two codefendants'; it is not used as a verb or adjective.

    Patterns

    • a codefendant in a case
    • someone's codefendant
    • be tried with a codefendant

    She and her codefendant both denied the charges.

    The judge asked the two codefendants to stand.

    His lawyer argued that the evidence came from his codefendant's phone.

  2. nouncountablelegal

    A person or organization named alongside another as a defendant in a civil lawsuit.

    Grammar: In civil cases it works the same way: each party sued together can be called a codefendant.

    Patterns

    • name someone as a codefendant
    • sue someone and a codefendant
    • a codefendant in a lawsuit

    The company was named as a codefendant in the lawsuit.

    Both the driver and the owner appear as codefendants.

    The bank settled with the plaintiff but the codefendant did not.

Word forms

pluralcodefendants

Common combinations

a codefendant in the case
He was a codefendant in the case against the firm.
named as a codefendant
The supplier was named as a codefendant in the suit.
his fellow codefendant
His fellow codefendant agreed to testify.
testify against a codefendant
She refused to testify against her codefendant.
a codefendant's statement
The police read out a codefendant's statement.

Synonyms and how they differ

defendant
Use 'defendant' for any single accused party; 'codefendant' only makes sense when there is at least one other accused person in the same case.
co-accused
Common in British news writing and slightly broader, since it can also appear as a plural noun without 'a'.
respondent
Used mainly in appeals and some civil tribunals rather than in a first-instance criminal trial.

Opposites

plaintiffprosecutor

Word family

defendant noun
A person accused or sued in court.
defense noun
The side arguing for the accused, or the argument itself.
defend verb
To argue for someone in court or protect them from a claim.

Commonly confused: codefendent or defendant? codefendent or co-respondent?

codefendent vs defendant

'Defendant' is one accused party; a 'codefendant' is one of two or more accused in the same case.

codefendent vs co-respondent

An old British legal term for a person named in a divorce case, not a general co-accused.

Practice

Two men are charged together with the same robbery. What do we call each of them in relation to the other?

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