Definition of "breaking and entering" [breaking and entering]

• The gaining of unauthorized, illegal access to another's premises, as by forcing a lock. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "“The super asked me to say, sir,” said Sergeant Roper, “that he was very sorry not to be here when you arrived, but seeing as how there’s been a first-class breaking and entering up to Moorton Park  —  ”"
• "“We’ve had nothing better than a few old drunks and speed merchants in this place for the last six months or more, and now, to-night, there’s got to be a breaking and entering job at Moorton Park with five thousand pounds’ worth of her ladyship’s jewellery gone and Lord knows what else besides."
• "There were still illegal elements in the affair, to be sure, such as breaking and entering the reservoir and the fact that the money did still technically belong to some bank or some armored car outfit or some insurance company or somebody other than Tom Jimson, but these seemed to Wally technical crimes at the level that caused toaster companies to pay fines in Federal court but no executives to go to prison."