In civil and military jurisprudence, summary execution is the putting to death of a person accused of a crime without the benefit of a free and fair trial. The term results from the legal concept of summary justice to punish a summary offense, as in the case of a drumhead court-martial, but the term usually denotes the summary execution of a sentence of death. Under international law, it is a combatant's refusal to accept an opponent's lawful surrender and the combatant's provision of no quarter, by killing the surrendering opponents.
Nguyễn Ngọc Loan summarily executes Viet Cong Captain Nguyễn Văn Lém in Saigon during the Tet Offensive in 1968.
This painting, The Third of May 1808 by Francisco Goya, depicts the summary execution of Spaniards by French forces after the Dos de Mayo Uprising in Madrid.
Polish people being executed by a German firing squad in Kórnik, October 1939
The execution of 56 Polish citizens in Bochnia, near Kraków, during German occupation of Poland, December 18, 1939, in a reprisal for an attack on a German police office two days earlier by the underground organization "White Eagle"
A summary offence or petty offence is a violation in some common law jurisdictions that can be proceeded against summarily, without the right to a jury trial and/or indictment.
The Melbourne Magistrates' Court. In Victoria, Australia, all summary offences are heard in the Magistrates' Court
