A death threat is a threat, often made anonymously, by one person or a group of people to kill another person or groups of people. These threats are usually designed to intimidate victims in order to manipulate their behavior, thus a death threat is a form of coercion. For example, a death threat could be used to dissuade a public figure from pursuing a criminal investigation or an advocacy campaign.
In many jurisdictions, death threats are a criminal offense. Death threats are often covered by coercion statutes. For instance, the coercion statute in Alaska says:
A person commits the crime of coercion if the person compels another to engage in conduct from which there is a legal right to abstain or abstain from conduct in which there is a legal right to engage, by means of instilling in the person who is compelled a fear that, if the demand is not complied with, the person who makes the demand or another may inflict physical injury on anyone....
Read more about Death Threat: Methods, Death Threats Against A Head of State, Osman Warning, Letter or Notice
Famous quotes containing the words death and/or threat:
“Could any death be so horrible as birth? Or any decrepitude so awful as childhood in a happy united God-fearing family?”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)
“An ill-trained doctor is a threat to life, an ill-trained priest a threat to faith.”
—Punjabi proverb, trans. by Gurinder Singh Mann.