as in to kidnap
to carry away (as a person) forcibly or unlawfully
the gangsters planned to abduct the industrialist's young daughter and demand a huge ransom from her family
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Recent Examples of abduct
For each of the murders, the four men either lured or abducted and drove the victims to the Angeles National Forest after the victims slighted the gang in different ways, according to the Justice Department.
—
Matthew Rodriguez, CBS News, 5 June 2026
Hansen abducted, raped and killed women by bringing them to remote locations and hunting them in the woods of Anchorage, Alaska, per The Washington Post.
—Caroline Blair, PEOPLE, 3 June 2026
Investigators say his criminal history shows he had been arrested for abducting a young woman a year ago but was released on $3,500 bail after 20 days.
—Isabel Debre, Los Angeles Times, 3 June 2026
Decades ago, two six-year-olds went missing for thirty-six hours, sparking a media frenzy that they had been briefly abducted by UFOs but eventually relegating them to a pop cultural punchline.
—Literary Hub, 1 June 2026
See All Example Sentences for abduct
Matthew Rodriguez, CBS News, 5 June 2026
Hansen abducted, raped and killed women by bringing them to remote locations and hunting them in the woods of Anchorage, Alaska, per The Washington Post.
—Caroline Blair, PEOPLE, 3 June 2026
Investigators say his criminal history shows he had been arrested for abducting a young woman a year ago but was released on $3,500 bail after 20 days.
—Isabel Debre, Los Angeles Times, 3 June 2026
Decades ago, two six-year-olds went missing for thirty-six hours, sparking a media frenzy that they had been briefly abducted by UFOs but eventually relegating them to a pop cultural punchline.
—Literary Hub, 1 June 2026
See All Example Sentences for abduct
Recent Examples of Synonyms for abduct
kidnap
Verb
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Last month, a Santa Monica man, also unaffiliated with the university, was charged with kidnapping a female UCLA student in March to try to rape her.—
Clara Harter,
Los Angeles Times,
30 May 2026
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Norm Green kidnaps our former hockey team to Texas, a place where ice is exclusively used to chill Lone Stars.—
DP Opinion,
Denver Post,
29 May 2026
Cite this Entry
“Abduct.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/abduct. Accessed 12 Jun. 2026.
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