How to Use abuse in a Sentence

abuse

1 of 2 noun
  • The prisoner hurled abuse at the judge.
  • She was subjected to every term of abuse her boss could think of.
  • He subjected his wife to physical and emotional abuse.
  • To be sure, there have been instances of FBI abuse of the system.
    The Editors, National Review, 12 Apr. 2024
  • Both were later charged with six felony child abuse charges.
    Sean Neumann, Peoplemag, 6 Sep. 2023
  • The harshest abuse came in moments of capture, rather than in the basement.
    Alex Horton, Washington Post, 13 Aug. 2023
  • The abuse was very public and everyone looked the other way.
    Callum McLennan, Variety, 1 Feb. 2024
  • Hildebrandt was also charged with six counts of felony child abuse.
    Daysia Tolentino, NBC News, 5 Sep. 2023
  • Princess Beatrice's subplot about substance abuse isn't in the film.
    Town & Country, 11 Aug. 2023
  • Survivors of abuse, however, saw the SNL appearance as the act of a prophet.
    Kory Grow, Rolling Stone, 29 July 2023
  • Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs has been accused of rape and a ‘cycle of abuse’ by his ex Cassie in a new lawsuit.
    Ryan Fonseca, Los Angeles Times, 17 Nov. 2023
  • Gomez, 25, has been charged with one count of child abuse without great bodily harm.
    David J. Neal, Miami Herald, 15 Feb. 2024
  • But then Lopez got an email from Rob, saying Jamie’s abuse was starting again and getting worse.
    Allie Weintraub, ABC News, 28 Sep. 2023
  • The couple plotted to kill Dee Dee as Gypsy sought to escape her mother’s abuse.
    Liam Quinn, Peoplemag, 9 Jan. 2024
  • If a school teacher is coming onto you, that’s an abuse of power.
    Jazz Monroe, Pitchfork, 28 Sep. 2023
  • Now, three of them face charges of assault and child abuse, according to Shelby County jail records.
    Olivia Lloyd, Charlotte Observer, 3 Apr. 2024
  • One was a 25-year-old with substance abuse issues who went to live with his mother on the Kenai Peninsula.
    Michelle Theriault Boots, Anchorage Daily News, 29 July 2023
  • He is accused of bribery, abuse of office and obstruction of justice.
    Philip Jankowski, Dallas News, 22 June 2023
  • But now, his career of calling out abuses of power is coming to an end.
    Sui-Lee Wee, New York Times, 17 Nov. 2023
  • Why choose to continue to sell this product and support monkey abuse?
    Stephen Underwood, Hartford Courant, 17 Jan. 2024
  • More court services to meet the mounting challenges of homelessness and substance abuse.
    Darrell Smith, Sacramento Bee, 26 Feb. 2024
  • Even after that, other cases of abuse were mishandled in the late 1990s or kept under wraps.
    Lee O. Sanderlin, Baltimore Sun, 25 Aug. 2023
  • Four other White ex-officers who pleaded guilty to the abuse will be sentenced later this week.
    Alexandra Banner, CNN, 20 Mar. 2024
  • State social workers received 14 abuse complaints about the couple, the suit stated.
    Jason Laughlin, BostonGlobe.com, 11 Aug. 2023
  • Police booked Harris into jail on one count of second-degree murder and one count of child abuse.
    The Arizona Republic, 9 Jan. 2024
  • P!nk, who has a daughter, Willow, and son, Jameson, has also been frank about her struggles with substance abuse.
    Beth Ann Mayer, Parents, 13 June 2023
  • Ruby Franke, a former family vlogger and a Utah mother of six, pleaded guilty to child abuse charges.
    Elizabeth Robinson, NBC News, 19 Dec. 2023
  • Despite the abuse allegations made against Jeremy, he has not been convicted of a crime.
    James Queally, Los Angeles Times, 28 Nov. 2023
  • Police said that the child's father was in the passenger seat of the car and was booked on charges of child abuse, endangerment and aggravated DUI.
    Aidan Wohl, The Arizona Republic, 4 Sep. 2023
  • Radius Outfitters makes overlanding gear that's designed to hold up to the abuse of living (and repairing) on the road.
    WIRED, 3 Nov. 2023
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abuse

2 of 2 verb
  • She abused her friend's trust.
  • He abused his body with years of heavy drinking.
  • He had abused his first car by not taking care of it.
  • He abused my confidence by letting this secret be known.
  • He was accused of sexually abusing a child.
  • The look that Asa gives in that very first shot, that’s a kid who’s been abused.
    Brenna Ehrlich, Rolling Stone, 28 Oct. 2023
  • He was tortured, abused, and beat up by inmates and guards.
    Lisa Deaderick, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 Aug. 2023
  • And that same huge store of data can be abused in other ways.
    Ned Temko, The Christian Science Monitor, 14 Dec. 2023
  • Mike Song thought about how AI can be abused and misused.
    Ellie Silverman, Washington Post, 14 Feb. 2024
  • Haenel shot her first film at 12 years old, and for the next three years, the director Christophe Ruggia abused her.
    Kally Patz, Vogue, 20 Oct. 2023
  • And, if it's abused by someone else outside of our control, then that's not -- that's not on us.
    CBS News, 28 May 2023
  • It’s revealed that Madu was abused by a dance instructor at a school in Nigeria.
    Common Sense Media, Washington Post, 5 Apr. 2024
  • The kids aren’t physically abused, just raised to be afraid, and also don’t want anything to do with me.
    Annie Lane, Anchorage Daily News, 19 Aug. 2023
  • The judge made the whimsical claim that JetBlue might abuse its new size to stop offering cut-rate fares.
    Stephen Moore, National Review, 23 Jan. 2024
  • Brown, a Jamaican immigrant, said drivers have been abused by Uber and Lyft for too long.
    Trisha Ahmed, Quartz, 8 Apr. 2024
  • The reality of priests abusing kids was no surprise to you?Absolutely not.
    Jim McDermott, Vulture, 2 Feb. 2024
  • Some of the boys were still of elementary school age when they were allegedly abused.
    Patrick Frater, Variety, 6 Sep. 2023
  • And combined with the girl making up an assault, is there a woman on this show who doesn’t lie about being abused?
    Vulture, 2 July 2023
  • Wheaton had a strong reaction to the footage and revealed he was abused in a similar way growing up.
    James Hibberd, The Hollywood Reporter, 8 Feb. 2024
  • Miller's lawyers said Ellen, who died in 2010, had abused him as a child, creating mental health problems.
    Paul Larosa, CBS News, 21 Oct. 2023
  • Pick up any piece of tech and Emma Pickering knows how it can be used to abuse, harass, and stalk women.
    WIRED, 4 Oct. 2023
  • Some of the scrolls have been sliced in half, scooped out and generally abused in ways that still make historians weep.
    Cheri Lucas Rowlands, Longreads, 5 Feb. 2024
  • Girls and boys who have lost parents, have been raped or abused, have been recruited as children into armed groups.
    Rob Williams, Variety, 16 Nov. 2023
  • Bernadine's daughter told police her mother was abused as a child.
    Sahana Jayaraman, AZCentral.com, 27 June 2023
  • Moreover, millions of people worldwide who didn’t abuse drugs and weren’t poor or malnourished have died of AIDS.
    Joshua Cohen, Forbes, 15 Feb. 2024
  • These entities abused their power to achieve a common goal: the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.
    Elizabeth Stauffer, Washington Examiner, 12 Jan. 2024
  • At the time, Deters revealed that investigators believed the girl had been abused for months.
    Brenton Blanchet, Peoplemag, 24 Feb. 2024
  • Due to the comfort that AI can bring, just like humans, technologies are capable of abusing trust.
    Hamilton Mann, Forbes, 24 Feb. 2024
  • Garcia was among eight prison workers, including a chaplain, charged with abusing inmates and the first to go to trial.
    Olga R. Rodriguez, USA TODAY, 18 Aug. 2023
  • He and his siblings were abused by their mother’s boyfriend and ultimately taken from their home and placed in foster care.
    Cory Shaffer, cleveland, 11 Sep. 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'abuse.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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