miscreant.

1. A person who commits wrongdoing or is regarded as villainous.

2. A person regarded as holding a false religion or lacking the true faith, in an older condemnatory use.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• an alleged miscreant
• the miscreant’s escape

On the page

The sheriff called the fugitive a miscreant before the charges were read.

In her playful account, the dog became the miscreant responsible for the vanished pie.

Usage notes

Primary category: literary. Forms: Singular miscreant; plural miscreants. Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1 only. Use numbered sense fields for all meanings.