PLUNDER (VERB)

The most common meaning of the term “to plunder” is to take property from persons or places by open force, and this may be in course of a lawful war, or by unlawful hostility, as in the case of pirates or banditti. But in another and very common meaning,’ though in some degree figurative, it is used to express the idea of taking property from a person or place, without just right but not expressing the nature or quality of the wrong done. Carter v. Andrews, 16 Pick. (Mass.) 9; U. S. v. Stone (C. C.) 8 Fed. 246; U. S. v. Pitman, 27 Fed. Cas. 540.