3,576 articles
Nita Neary
Nita Neary, Chi Omega sorority resident and eyewitness in the Ted Bundy murders trial, saw a club-wielding man leaving the house on January 15, 1978, and identified Bundy at the 1979 Miami trial.
No-knock warrant
No-knock warrant: US search warrant authorizing police to enter without knocking or announcing; rooted in knock-and-announce exceptions (Richards v. Wisconsin), restricted after Breonna Taylor's 2020 death, with state bans and DOJ 2021 limits.
Noelia Castillo euthanasia case
Noelia Castillo Ramos (2000–2026), a Barcelona woman left paraplegic by a 2022 suicide attempt, received legal euthanasia in Spain on 26 March 2026 after a 601-day court battle with her father through all instances including the ECtHR.
Noir fiction
Noir fiction, also called roman noir, is a crime fiction subgenre whose doomed protagonists commit crimes rather than solve them, emerging from American pulp magazines in the 1930s.
Nolle prosequi
Nolle prosequi (nol. pros.), Latin for "unwilling to prosecute," is a prosecutor's formal abandonment of charges, in criminal or civil suits. Unlike acquittal, it does not bar refiling; federal Rule 48 requires leave of court.
Nollie Martin
Nollie Lee Martin, Florida murderer executed by electrocution May 12, 1992 for the 1977 rape-murder of student Patricia Greenfield; case produced Ford v. Wainwright competency litigation and Rule 3.811.
Nolo contendere
Nolo contendere, or no contest, is a criminal plea in which a defendant neither admits nor denies guilt but accepts conviction and punishment. It requires court consent under Federal Rule 11 and is generally inadmissible in later civil cases under FRE 410.
Non bis in idem
Non bis in idem (ne bis in idem), the double-jeopardy principle barring repeat trial or punishment for the same offence, as set out in the Rome Statute Article 20, ECHR Protocol No. 7 Article 4, ICCPR Article 14(7), and EU Charter Article 50.
Noose
Noose: a tightening rope loop, best known as the hangman's ligature in judicial hanging. Covers the long-drop mechanism, 9,322 U.S. hangings 1608–2002, botched hangings, and use in Iran, Japan, Taiwan.
Norrmalmstorg robbery
Norrmalmstorg robbery (Norrmalmstorgsdramat): six-day 1973 Kreditbanken hostage siege in Stockholm by Jan-Erik Olsson and Clark Olofsson; origin of the 'Stockholm syndrome' label, later disputed by research and hostage testimony.
Norte del Valle Cartel
Norte del Valle Cartel (Cartel del Norte del Valle), Colombian cocaine trafficking organization based in northern Valle del Cauca that dominated the trade after the Cali cartel's 1995 fall, exporting over 500 metric tons of cocaine to the US before its 1994-2011 collapse.
Norteños
Norteños (Spanish for "northerners") are Hispanic street gangs in Northern and Central California aligned with the Nuestra Familia prison gang in opposition to the Sureños.
North Side Gang
North Side Gang: Prohibition-era Irish-led Chicago crime organization north of the Chicago River, rival of Al Capone; led by Dean O'Banion (murdered 1924), attacked Cicero in 1926, and lost seven members in the 1929 St. Valentine's Day massacre.
Not proven
Not proven: former third criminal verdict unique to Scottish juries (guilty, not guilty, not proven), an acquittal identical in legal effect to not guilty but implying insufficient proof. Abolished from 1 January 2026 under the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Act 2025, with a two-thirds conviction majority.
November Criminals (film)
November Criminals is a 2017 American crime drama directed by Sacha Gervasi, starring Ansel Elgort and Chloë Grace Moretz, based on Sam Munson's novel.
Nth Room case (N번방 사건)
Nth Room case (N번방 사건): South Korean digital sex exploitation ring run via numbered Telegram chat rooms, 2018–2020; operators Cho Ju-bin (40 years) and Moon Hyung-wook (34 years); dozens of victims including minors; triggered 2020 anti-Nth Room laws.
Nucky Thompson
Nucky Thompson (Enoch Malachi Thompson) is the fictional protagonist of HBO's Boardwalk Empire, played by Steve Buscemi; a corrupt Atlantic City treasurer and bootlegger loosely based on real boss Enoch L. Johnson, killed by Tommy Darmody in the 1931 finale.
Nuestra Familia
Nuestra Familia (NF, "Our Family") is a California prison gang founded in 1968, rival of the Mexican Mafia, ruled by a seven-member General Council, controlling Norteño street gangs through regiments and tax collection.
Nutraloaf
Nutraloaf (food loaf, disciplinary loaf) is a bland, nutritionally complete baked loaf served to misbehaving US prisoners for days to months; courts generally upheld it under the Eighth Amendment, with exceptions such as LeMaire's use limits, Borden's hearing requirement, and Prude v. Clarke.
O. J. Simpson robbery case
The O. J. Simpson robbery case: the 2007 Las Vegas Palace Station hotel room gunpoint confrontation with memorabilia dealers Beardsley and Fromong, Simpson's 2008 conviction on 12 counts, 9-to-33-year sentence, and 2017 parole.
Oakland County Child Killer
Oakland County Child Killer (OCCK), also called the Babysitter, is the unidentified killer of four Michigan children, Mark Stebbins, Jill Robinson, Kristine Mihelich, and Timothy King, abducted 1976-1977 near Woodward Avenue, held 3-19 days, and never identified or charged.
Oba Chandler
Oba Chandler (1946-2011), American murderer executed in Florida in 2011 for the 1989 Tampa Bay killings of tourists Joan, Michelle, and Christe Rogers; identified via handwriting billboards, distinct from other Chandlers.
October 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery
The October 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery: vault supervisor David Scott Ghantt stole about $17.4 million from the Charlotte, North Carolina vault with Kelly Campbell and Steve and Michelle Chambers, fled to Mexico, and was caught after the conspirators' conspicuous spending; 17 people pled guilty.
Offender profiling
Offender profiling (criminal profiling, FBI criminal investigative analysis, UK behavioral investigative advice): inferring offender attributes from crime scene, modus operandi, and victimology to narrow suspect searches; validity remains statistically unvalidated, case linkage strongest.
Ohio State Reformatory
Ohio State Reformatory (Mansfield Reformatory): former Mansfield, Ohio prison, 1896-1990, designed by Levi Scofield, closed after inmate lawsuit, now a museum and The Shawshank Redemption filming site.
Oklahoma Girl Scout murders
The Oklahoma Girl Scout murders: the June 13, 1977 killings of three Girl Scouts (Lori Farmer, Michelle Guse, Doris Milner) at Camp Scott near Locust Grove; Gene Leroy Hart was tried and acquitted, and the case remains open.
Old Sparky
Old Sparky is a nickname for US prison electric chairs, most famously Texas's chair used for 361 executions (1924-1964), now at the Texas Prison Museum in Huntsville; other states' chairs share the name.
Omaima Nelson
Omaima Aree Nelson (born 1968), Egyptian-born American convicted of the 1991 second-degree murder and dismemberment of her husband William Nelson in Costa Mesa, California; sentenced in 1993 and denied parole repeatedly since 2006.
Omar Khadr
Omar Khadr, Canadian captured at 15 in Afghanistan in 2002, held at Guantanamo, convicted by US military commission in 2010, repatriated 2012, received Canadian apology and $10.5M settlement in 2017.
Omega (prison gang)
Omega is a monoethnic Malay Muslim prison gang formed in Singapore prisons in the late 1980s, the most significant Malay secret society in post-independence Singapore, which evolved from a prison protection group into a transnational drug-trafficking enterprise.