Heinous is a masculine adjective that means ugly, unclean, horrible and disgusting.
Some synonyms of heinous are disgusting, abominable, barbaric, cruel, repulsive, etc.
In a figurative sense, hideous can describe something stinky. This sense of the word is related to its etymology, as it originates in Latin foetibundus, term used to qualify something that smells bad.
Heinous crime
It is classified as a heinous crime that is committed with extreme violence and/or that causes revulsion.
The heinous designation does not just describe a specific crime that is considered horrible and of high seriousness, but it is a set of crimes that are considered more serious and revolting and therefore the penalties are more heavy.
As heinous crimes are approached as being more cruel, they are not susceptible to pardon, grace and amnesty. In these cases, a surety is not established either.
Examples of heinous crimes
THE law 8072/90 describes as heinous crimes:
- murder;
- aggravated homicide;
- Robbery;
- extortion qualified by death;
- extortion through kidnapping and in a qualified manner;
- rape;
- vulnerable rape;
- epidemic resulting in death;
- forgery, corruption, adulteration or alteration of a product intended for therapeutic or medicinal purposes;
- genocide;
- favoring prostitution or any other form of sexual exploitation of a child or adolescent or a vulnerable person.