damming warrant
n.— «Napolitano said a practice known as “damming warrants” has resulted in the state seizing $15 million in the last year from 12,400 wire transfers. The name comes from the procedure which allows state prosecutors to get a court order to “dam” up wire transfers unless and until the person to whom the money was sent can show the cash is for a legal purpose.» —“Human smugglers’ $15M ‘dammed up’” by Howard Fischer in Phoeniz Arizona Daily Star (Tucson) Mar. 21, 2006. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
When you had sleepovers as a child, what did you call the makeshift beds you made on the floor? In some places, you call those bedclothes and blankets a pallet. This word comes from an old term for “straw.” And: What’s the story...
Nate in Tucson, Arizona, says his grandmother from Nova Scotia used to express surprise with the exclamation dear me suz! It goes back to the 1820s and is likely a form of dear me, sirs! Variants include suz alive, law me suz, oh suz alive, and law...