Definition
Without specific aim, selection, or purpose; in a haphazard or indiscriminate manner. In legal usage, "at random" typically describes conduct lacking deliberate direction toward a particular target or object — shooting or acting without singling out any specific person or thing. The phrase appears most often in criminal and tort contexts where the presence or absence of intentional targeting affects the characterization of an act, the degree of offense, or the scope of liability.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Randomly, haphazardly.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): "At random" is defined as without settled aim or direction; in a haphazard way.
The common meaning and the legal meaning are closely aligned, but the legal application is more precise than everyday usage suggests. In ordinary speech, "at random" describes anything done without a plan. In legal contexts, the phrase carries a technical edge: it functions as a negative marker of intent. To act "at random" is to act without targeting a specific person or thing — and that distinction can determine criminal culpability or civil liability. The everyday sense of randomness does not carry this burden.
Common Confusion
"At random" is sometimes conflated with "recklessly" or used interchangeably with "indiscriminately." These are related but distinct concepts. Recklessness is a mens rea standard — it describes conscious disregard of a substantial risk. "At random" describes the absence of specific targeting, which may or may not coincide with recklessness. A person can act recklessly while still aiming at something particular. Conversely, firing "at random" often implies recklessness, but the two concepts operate on different analytical planes: one addresses state of mind, the other addresses the directedness of the act itself.
Why It Matters in Research
The phrase "at random" functions as a liability boundary marker in older case law and statutes, particularly in firearms and assault contexts. Its significance is largely interpretive: courts used it to distinguish deliberate targeting (which establishes specific intent or willfulness) from undirected conduct (which may reduce or transform the nature of the offense).
The Bouvier's citation — drawn from a Texas criminal case — illustrates the operative distinction precisely: intentionally shooting at a dog is not shooting "at random," because the act was directed at a specific target. Researchers working in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century criminal law materials should be alert to this usage when the phrase appears in jury instructions, indictments, or appellate opinions. The presence or absence of "at random" language in such documents is not rhetorical; it signals something about how the factfinder was directed to assess intent and targeting.
In modern law, the phrase appears less frequently as a term of art and more as descriptive language, but it retains legal weight in statutes addressing mass endangerment, drive-by shootings, or firing into occupied structures — contexts where the absence of a specific victim is an element of the offense rather than a mitigating circumstance. Researchers should check whether a given jurisdiction's statute treats "at random" as aggravating (endangering multiple indeterminate persons) rather than mitigating (absence of premeditation toward a specific victim), as the valence can invert depending on the statutory framework.
Corpus researchers should also note that "at random" in jury selection contexts — drawing jurors "at random" — is an entirely separate usage with no overlap in meaning or doctrine. Context is essential to avoid cross-contaminating research threads.
Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's treatment of the phrase is spare but instructive. The single illustrative citation establishes the phrase's legal function by negation: intentional, directed conduct cannot be "at random." This framing — defining the term by what it excludes rather than what it encompasses — is characteristic of how courts used the phrase in the period. Bouvier does not offer a formal definition, suggesting the term was treated as self-evident in common usage and required only clarification at the margins.
Historical dictionaries generally do not give "at random" an independent legal entry beyond what common usage already supplied. The gap between common and legal meaning was narrow enough that extensive treatment was unnecessary. What the historical sources miss is the phrase's structural role in criminal pleading and jury instruction practice, where its presence or absence in the charging document could affect the government's burden of proof on intent.
Jurisdictional Note
Modern statutory usage varies. Some jurisdictions use "at random" as an element of aggravated or reckless endangerment offenses, where firing or acting without a specific target is what creates the broader public danger. Researchers should not assume the phrase carries uniform weight across jurisdictions or across time periods within a single jurisdiction.