Piso's Justice
Preserved but no longer current.
Verbally right, but morally wrong. Seneca tells us that Piso con- demned a man on circumstantial evidence for murder; but when the suspect was at the place of execution, the man supposed to have been murdered appeared. The centurion sent the prisoner to Piso, and explained the case to him; whereupon Piso condemned all three to death, saying, Fiat justitia (Lat., let justice be done).
Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)
Sources & notes
Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.
Common questions
What does “Piso's Justice” mean?
Verbally right, but morally wrong. Seneca tells us that Piso con- demned a man on circumstantial evidence for murder; but when the suspect was at the place of execution, the man supposed to have been murdered appeared. The centurion sent the prisoner to Piso, and explained the case to him; whereupon Piso condemned all three to death, saying, Fiat justitia (Lat., let justice be done).
Is “Piso's Justice” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.