Extortion
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Extortion is the practice of obtaining benefit from an individual or group through coercion, usually by threatening them with future psychological or physical harm. In most jurisdictions it is likely
Loot and Extortion. Statues at Trago Mills, poking fun at the Inland Revenue.
Shafer cartoon about mugging
Usury
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Usury is the practice of making loans that are seen as unfairly enriching the lender. The term may be used in a moral sense—condemning taking advantage of others' misfortunes—or in a legal sense, wher
Extortion
…of something such as pain and suffering or making somebody endure something unpleasant. The term extortion is often used metaphorically to refer to usury or to price-gouging, though neither is legally considered extortion. It is also often used loosely to refer to everyday situations where one person…
Of Usury, from Brant's Stultifera Navis (Ship of Fools), 1494; woodcut attributed to Albrecht Dürer
Christ Drives the Usurers Out of the Temple, a woodcut by Lucas Cranach the Elder in Passionary of Christ and Antichrist
St. Bernardino of Siena, treatise on contracts and usury (Tractatus de contractis et usuris), manuscript, 15th century
Magna Carta commands, "If any one has taken anything, whether much or little, by way of loan from Jews, and if he dies before that debt is paid, the debt shall not carry usury so long as the heir is under age, from whomsoever he may hold. And if that debt falls into our hands, we will take only the principal contained in the note."