Spoliation
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence · Benjamin Vaughan Abbott · 1879
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence
1.
In ecclesiastical law, an injury done by one clerk or incumbent to another, in taking the fruits of his benefice without any right to them, but under a pretended title. It also seems to be used for a suit brought to recover the fruits of a church, or even the church itself, by one incumbent against another, when they both claim by one patron, and the right of patronage is not called in question.
Termes de la Ley. 2.
In the law of evidence, it is used not as a technical term, but as an apt word for destroying, mutilating, or altering a writing, to prevent its being used as evidence. See Omnia Pr^sumdn-