pleas

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of plea.

   Both prisoners entered not-guilty pleas at the morning hearing.

   The charity's mailbox overflowed with pleas from families in need.

   Note

   The plural covers two different worlds. In everyday use, pleas are appeals and urgent entreaties, or excuses offered for a fault. In law, they are a party's formal answers: what a defendant alleges in reply to the plaintiff's declaration and demand. In the narrowest legal sense, a plea is an allegation of fact, as distinguished from a demurrer.

2. 2
   verbdialectalEnglandScotland

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of plea. Dialectal, meaning pleads.

   Note

   A dialect form. In parts of England and Scotland, plea itself works as a verb meaning "to plead" or "to argue," and pleas is its form after he, she or it. Elsewhere that sense belongs to plead, so standard writing has "she pleads with the board." Outside those regions, pleas is likely to be read as the plural of the noun.

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