warrants

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of warrant.

   Officers executed three warrants across the city before dawn.

   The court issued warrants for the witnesses who failed to appear.

   Note

   The plural belongs to the countable senses of warrant, and they sit far apart. In law, warrants authorize a search, seizure or arrest. In finance, warrants are options to buy an issuer's securities, usually issued alongside another security. The broad sense of sanction is often uncountable, so it rarely takes the plural. The same spelling is also the present-tense verb.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of warrant.

   The new evidence warrants a fresh investigation into the case.

   Her minor mistake hardly warrants such a harsh response.

   Note

   Every sense behind this form is transitive, so warrants always needs an object: the evidence warrants a fresh look. Its everyday job is the "justify" sense, often softened with hardly. The colloquial "believe strongly" use mostly lives in the first person, as in I warrant, so it seldom surfaces here. The older meanings of protecting someone or guaranteeing them something are obsolete.

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