Outlaw

An outlaw is a person living the lifestyle of outlawry, meaning literally "outside the law." In the common law of England, a judgment declaring someone an outlaw was one of the harshest penalties in the legal system, since the outlaw could not use the legal system to protect himself if needed, such as from mob justice.

Though the judgment of outlawry is now obsolete (even though it inspired the pro forma Outlawries Bill which is still to this day introduced in the British House of Commons during the State Opening of Parliament), romanticised outlaws became stock characters in several fictional settings, particularly in Western movies. Thus, "outlaw" is still commonly used for those living that lifestyle, whether actual criminals evading the law or those merely opposed to "law-and-order" notions of authority (such as the "outlaw country" movement in the 1970's).