Third person singular present tense of 'arraign'; to formally charge someone with a crime or call them before a court to answer charges.
From the verb 'arraign', derived from Old French 'arainier', meaning to call to account or accuse in court, from 'a-' + 'rainier' (to plead or reason).
When a prosecutor 'arraigns' a defendant, they're invoking centuries of legal tradition—the word and procedure haven't fundamentally changed much since medieval times, making it one of the oldest surviving legal rituals in English courts.
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