If there are any lawyers out there that don't mind a dumb question. What the hell does "mopery" mean?

Is it a legal term at all, like assult, burglary, etc?

And no, I don't have a Websters.

"Mopery" is a term often used by Police to refer to a the actions/conduct of a generally worthless individual who really deserves to go to jail, but has not committed any specific act for which he could be arrested. It probably has been tagged onto a booking sheet a few times though. Its an inside joke, not a legal term in any sense.

The average attorney would probably have no idea what you are talking about, a LEO would, at least one who has been around long enough to be eligible for retirement.

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Gunsmithing since 1961

I am unaware of any statute dealing with mopery. At least in my State.

However, back before I was a lawyer, I was a young police officer and this was one of the "crimes" we joked about, like "Shooting Into Occupied Clothing." Or, "Fornicating On A Federal." Or, "Creeping With Intent To Lurk."

Bob

Mopery. That's what I felt every time my Dad said it was time to castrate the pigs headed to market. Can I say that? By the way, Dad was the king of procrastination and the piggies usually weighed somewhere between 180 and 200 pounds. That's not the kind of operaton they took peaceably. Whew!

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Isaiah 55:8-9
Phil. 4:13

'Mopary'...I'm guilty of this..have both a Dodge Challenger..and a Dodge truck..plus an old Jeep truck.

'Mopary'...didn't know it was a crime!

OK thanks, I read it in a detective story. As in "Billy Bob was well known to the police for mopery."

As long as you are not charged with buggery, you are fine.

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Fidelis Ad Mortem

Mopary. It is a condition I experienced one time. I was running a 6 pack 440 1969 Super Bee with a 72 340 Demon. He kept beating me by about a couple car lengths, I told him to try it once more because I couldn't seem to get off the line without burning out bad. He said OK and pulled off the road and pulled his hood off. 4 hood pins and a fiberglass 13 lb. hood. remember those? anyways, he was turning a little wing nut that operated the linkage for the other two carbs. He had been running on the center 2 barrel. I experienced a sever case of Mopary right there. God I miss gaining speed uphill.
And that is my limited/distorted meaning of "Mopary"
Peace,
Gordon

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better have that checked

Mopery with Intent to Gouk. A misdemeanor in SE Michigan.
Especially near Detroit.

Not that Wiki is the final word:

Mopery is a vague, informal, and usually humorous name for minor offenses. The word is based on the verb to mope, which originally meant “to wander aimlessly”; it only later acquired the overtones of “bored and depressed”. The word mope appears to have first been used in the 16th century, and appears in Shakespeare's works.

In 1970, in Columbus, Ohio, mopery was defined as “loitering while walking, or walking down the street with no clear destination or purpose”, and was used by police to harass counterculture “hippies” who were regarded as unsavory. Some of those arrested were aggressively prosecuted by public prosecutor Karl T. Chrastan. In discussions of law, “mopery” is used as a placeholder name to mean some crime whose nature is not important to the problem at hand. This is sometimes expanded to “mopery with intent to creep” or "mopery with intent to gawk".

Kinda like "Felonious Failure to Do Right"; which can often be pled down to "Misdeameanor Misonmer".

Okay, now that we know what mopery is, what is "maintaining a nuisance"?

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I always take precautions

"Stupid in a NO STUPID zone"

This one works good too!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Gunsmithing since 1961

Not to be confused with "aggravated stupid".

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Forum consigliere

Mom used to tell me to stop my "moping"

To be gloomy or dejected.
To brood or sulk.

sure glad I didn't get arrested

"Mopery with malice aforethought", "Mopery in Public" "Malfesance with extreme prejudice"...

[QUOTE=WR Moore;136133526This is sometimes expanded to “mopery with intent to creep” or "mopery with intent to gawk".[/QUOTE]

Ah yes, that rated right up there with "malicious hooliganism" as a reason to detain a suspect.

Do not be caught committing the offense of "Mopery with Intent to Gape".

Or the offense of "Mopery on the High Seas", it a naval offense.

Rule 303

In its most severe form, it was "Aggravated Mopery with Intent to Gawk." Often used by Northern Illinois lawmen when transporting undesireables to the city limits, where they were met by the next jurisdiction's enforcement agency, and transported to their limits, etc.

The really worthless ones, we used to talk about "felony mopery". Bad. Real Bad.

I've heard of "bus therapy".

A collection is taken up from the on duty officers, and a one way bus ticket is bouught for how ever far the money will go. The problem, who was usually intoxicated, wakes up in another county and out of your hair for however many days it takes him to thumb (for you younger guys, that means hitch hiking on the side of the highway to bum a ride) home.

Urban dictionary on mopery:

1. mopery
Exposing yourself to a blind man
by Mitch Kumpstein Jan 17, 2003

2. mopery
"indecent exposure in the presence of a blind person of the same sex" is mopery

3. mopery
Loitering while walking. Hanging out in an environ, i.e. a particular block; moving so as to avoid arrest on more traditional loitering charges. Mopery is not a real charge or violation of the law, but a descriptive term, stretching the legalities of loitering, which would include staying in one place.
So you are convicted of mopery, not loitering.
loiter sell drugs hang out wander have a purpose

Every street cop knows the "mopery" is the formal term for the act of failing the "hello test".

"Exposing yourself to a blind person"
-from Revenge of the Nerds

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This...is my BOOMSTICK

OK, now that one got me!

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James L. "Jim" Rhiner

I guess it's the sort of "crime" that gets you put on "Double secret probation" eh?

Mopery is likely also related to mosery. It is a term that was frequently used in the northeast around NY to refer to the Jewish vendors that moved from place to place. Later it came to mean those that wandered around or loitered.

A lesser included offense of Lurking and Peering in the Dark.

Never been convicted of mopery.

I have pled guilty to persiflage on several occasions.

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and what his trumpet saith

Mopery.., I've heard the term and had a general idea of what was meant by it, but never used it myself. Way back in the good/bad old days we used J.J.F. B.D. "jumping, jiving, fooling in a business district." Until 1978 or so more than one mouth spent a Friday night early Saturday morning in lock-up on those charges.

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Always Stay Strong!