Plural of appellee; the parties being appealed against, or those responding to an appeal in a higher court.
From 'appeal' (Latin appellare) plus -ee (suffix meaning 'recipient of an action'), referring to those who receive an appeal.
Appellees have an advantage they don't always use: they only need to defend what they won before, not prove anything new, which is why many appellees simply say 'the lower court got it right.'
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.