The Attractive Nuisance Doctrine, in law, is a principle defining the legal responsibility of anyone who maintains on his property something of potential danger to children that, by its nature, will attract them. This may be an object, a condition, or any agency that is dangerous because young children are not able to discern and recognize peril. An example would be an unprotected backyard swimming pool or a scaffold left unsafe and unprotected on a construction site. The owner of premises must take precautions against injury from any attraction that can induce children to play on the site.

An ombudsman is an independent public officer who is appointed to receive complaints from citizens about abuses, unreasonable acts, or delays by government agencies. He investigates and reports his findings and recommends solutions.

The ombudsman may also initiate investigations of his own. The weapons he uses have been characterized as persuasion, criticism, and publicity. He is not empowered to reverse administrative action. However, the ombudsman's recommendations carry considerable weight and in some instances have led to changes in state or municipal laws.

Examples of the way in which ombudsmen have solved problems in the United States include instances in which a resident of a state had problems getting welfare allotments and food stamps. The ombudsman was able to get action by referring the complaint to the local welfare department and following it up personally. In another state, action was taken on behalf of a citizen who was unable to collect his unemployment compensation. In addition to rectifying the matter, the ombudsman prompted the state department of labor to alter its administrative procedures.

Damages are sums of money, awarded by civil courts to persons found to be victims of wrongful acts, which must be paid to the victim by the person or persons proven to be legally responsible. Compensatory damages are intended simply to compensate the victim for losses resulting from wrongful conduct. But there are also punitive damages, awarded not merely to compensate the victim but to punish a particularly outrageous wrongdoer.

Espionage, the organized employment of secret agents by governments to obtain information concerning other countries which cannot be obtained by open methods. It also includes the dissemination of false information intended to deceive other countries. As the essence of espionage is secrecy, it follows that any treatise upon the subject, purporting to give details of the inner workings of any particular current system, must be regarded with doubt. Secret information has immense value, especially for military commanders.

A trial, in law, a hearing in court before an impartial judge and often before a jury, at which all the facts relevant to the solution of a legal dispute are developed. The right to a fair trial is guaranteed by the due process clauses of the 5th and 14th amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

Habeas Corpus in English and U. S. law, in its commonest form is a legal proceeding used to determine whether one person is entitled to retain custody of another. The person in custody petitions a court by writ (formal legal document) to direct his custodian to produce the petitioner and explain the reason for the detention. Traditionally, whether the petitioner is retained in custody or discharged - either absolutely or subject to bail - depends on whether the court finds the custodian's explanation for detention legally adequate. At common law the veracity of the custodian's explanation could not be challenged. But by 1950 some courts in the United States had begun to determine whether the justification offered by the custodian was factually accurate.

In England an assault at common law is constituted by the unlawful menacing of another so as to cause him to think that physical violence will be used against him. The actual use of force on another is a battery. Assault is both an offense against the criminal law and a tort founding a civil action for damages. For both purposes a menacing gesture is capable of being an assault, but words alone are probably insufficient. Even a menacing gesture will not be an assault if it is made in circumstances which do not cause it to inspire fear in a reasonable man, e.g. where no immediate physical violence is possible.

Contempt of Court, in English law, may be either criminal contempt, which is the commission of acts tending to obstruct the due administration of justice, or civil contempt, which consists of disobedience to orders of a superior court. Civil contempt is dealt with summarily by the court against which it is committed. The object of committing a person to prison for civil contempt is purely coercive. A definite term is not imposed; the prisoner is released when the contempt is purged. Appeal against committal for civil contempt lies to the Court of Appeal.

Bribery, in law, is the crime of voluntarily offering, promising, giving, receiving, agreeing to receive, or soliciting any sum of money Or other thing of value with the corrupt intent of influencing the action of a public officer in the discharge of his official duties.

Decree Nisi is a law term used in regard to a Divorce Court decree which annuls a marriage, if at the end of six months nothing arises to interfere with the decision, whereupon it is made absolute, and the parties are free.