Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use detain in a sentence

40 example sentences · verb

Detain means to keep something from proceeding or coming to completion; to delay. Example: “He was detained late Tuesday after deboarding a British Airways flight from London.”

Examples of detain by meaning

verbTo put someone under custody.

  • She's detained and questioned by Muller, and, even though she tries to lie that she didn't do anything, they have footage of her ascending the tree on her own.2021 August 16, “Exploring the SCP Foundation: SCP-6002 - All Creatures Great and Small” (19:06 from the start), in The Exploring Series...

More sentences with detain

  • He was detained late Tuesday after deboarding a British Airways flight from London.From the entry deboard
  • The detained train finally arrived hours late.From the entry detained
  • The heavy rain was a detaining on their progress.From the entry detaining
  • The suspect’s detaining lasted several hours.From the entry detaining
  • Arthur Berto, a 13-year-old living in Everett, Massachusetts, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.2026 February 17, Aaron Blake, “The many claims by Trump’s DHS that have fallen apart”, in CNN, archived from the original on 20 Feb 2026. From the entry Everett
  • The Chinese government has reportedly detained more than a million Muslims in reeducation camps.2019, Lindsay Maizland, “China’s Repression of Uighurs in Xinjiang”, in Council on Foreign Relations, archived from the original on 10 Dec…. From the entry Uighur
  • The police have detained managers of the companies involved with the tour bus that crashed.[2014 August 10, Dan Levin, “44 Dead in Tour Bus Crash in Tibet”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 11…. From the entry Nyêmo
  • If the accused is unable to make bail, he or she is detained in jail.2011, Larry J. Siegel, Criminology, page 658. From the entry bail
  • The actor that detained her had one line in that particular scene and flubbed it.2008, D. L. White, Acting For Film And Television, page 37. From the entry flub
  • Jen Wofford, a local activist, was arrested and detained last September for wheatpasting Queer Nation posters.1991 February 11, Ed Boyce, “Bashers With Badges”, in Gay Community News, volume 18, number 29, page 6. From the entry wheatpaste
  • The problem of 'verballing' is unlikely to disappear, whatever the legal status of the person detained.1982, John A. Andrews, Human Rights in Criminal Procedure: A Comparative Study, BRILL, →ISBN, page 128. From the entry verbal
  • The communists demand the release of all prisoners detained by Saigon – not only the so-called PoWs.1972, Alexander Casella, “Saigon’s prisoners”, in Far Eastern Economic Review, volume 78, page 24, column 1. From the entry pow
  • They also took the ship to the Paichuan Islands, detaining it for 48 hours.1955, Hsinhua News Agency Release, →OCLC, page 201, column 2. From the entry Paichuan
  • 'I don't think that there is anything more to detain us here,' remarked the strategist dispassionately.1927, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], Max Carrados Mysteries. From the entry dispassionately
  • His wife, Cilia Flores, was also detained.2026 January 5, Callum Sutherland, “Who Is Cilia Flores? What to Know About Maduro’s Wife Amid Fall of Venezuela's First Couple”, in TIME…. From the entry alone
  • Yet after her brother was detained and disappeared by Israeli forces at a checkpoint as he evacuated south months ago, Ms.2024 October 25, Ghada Abdulfattah and Taylor Luck, “Under deadly Israeli siege, north Gaza residents face terrifying ultimatum”, in The…. From the entry disappear
  • There have been numerous reports of snatch squads detaining men on the street and drafting them into the army.2022 September 19, Luke Harding, “Russia no longer has full control of Luhansk as Ukraine recaptures village”, in The Guardian. From the entry snatch squad
  • There shall be provided an infirmary or a place for the treatment of sick detained person in every place of detention.2015, Minister for Home Affairs, “Regulation 7”, in Prevention of Terrorism (Detained Persons) Regulations…. From the entry infirmary
  • Last month, eight people were detained on accusations of trying to publicize a self-immolation in Luchu County in Gansu Province.2013 January 16, Andrew Jacobs, “China Arrests 7 in New Effort to Stop Tibetan Self-Immolations”, in The New York Times, archived from the…. From the entry Luchu
  • Justice North agreed with the lawyers who brought the case that the rescuees were effectively and completely detained by the government.2004, Daniel Ross, Violent Democracy, page 116. From the entry rescuee
  • Japanese authorities questioned the seven Chinese activists after detaining them for their allegedly illegal visit to the isle of Uotsuri.2004 March 26, Kenji Hall, “Japan Deports Seven Chinese Activists”, in AP News, archived from the original on 18 May 2023. From the entry Uotsuri
  • Two army soldiers detained for robbery and theft escaped from the maximum-security military penitentiary in Hsintien, Taipei County, yesterday evening.2000 June 17, Irene Lin, “Two soldiers flee maximum-security Hsintien prison”, in Taipei Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original…. From the entry Hsintien
  • Federal agents are going to descend on this place like locusts in about twenty minutes, max, and they’ll detain everyone.1998, Laura J. Mixon, Proxies, page 270. From the entry interrobang
  • The Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office detained an adult stepson who broke into his parents’ home and was involved in a standoff with deputies in Orangevale.2026 January 1, Emma Kidger, “Orangevale home invasion: Stepson in standoff with sheriff’s office”, in KTXL, archived from the original on…. From the entry standoff
  • Justice Brett Kavanaugh undid an order by a lower court that barred immigration authorities from using ethnicity as cause to arrest and detain.2026 February 3, Ricardo Pimentel, “As the ICE crackdown continues, empathy lives and hope stays alive”, in Wisconsin Examiner. From the entry Kavanaugh stop
  • Once we started detaining and deporting everyone who crossed the border and removing illegal aliens from the United States, they simply stopped coming.2025 September 23, Donald Trump, speech at United Nations. From the entry go to hell
  • The official White House account on X even shared a Studio Ghibli-style image of an ICE officer detaining an alleged illegal immigrant.2025 March 28, Billy Perrigo, “How Those Studio Ghibli Memes Are a Sign of OpenAI's Trump-Era Shift”, in Time, New York, N.Y.: Time Inc.…. From the entry Ghiblified
  • People are also being apprehended and detained far into the Greek mainland before being returned to the Evros region to be illegally returned.2021 June 23, Amnesty International, “Greece: Pushbacks and violence against refugees and migrants are de facto border policy”, in…. From the entry Evros
  • Among those who told NBC News they were detained was Omer, who was born in Guma County, a predominantly Uighur part of Xinjiang region.2020 September 9, Willem Marx, Olivia Sumrie, “Uighurs accuse China of mass detention, torture in landmark complaint”, in NBC News…. From the entry Guma
  • Most of the people who have been arbitrarily detained are Uighur, a predominantly Turkic-speaking ethnic group primarily from China’s northwestern region of Xinjiang.2019, Lindsay Maizland, “China’s Repression of Uighurs in Xinjiang”, in Council on Foreign Relations, archived from the original on 10 Dec…. From the entry Uighur
  • If an offender recidivates during pretrial release, then he is detained after rearraignment under the 64 policies in Table 1 and the status quo policy.2015 December 30, “Assessing Risk-Based Policies for Pretrial Release and Split Sentencing in Los Angeles County Jails”, in PLOS ONE, →DOI. From the entry rearraignment
  • Afghan National Police, backed by U.S.-led coalition forces, detained an insurgent leader during a raid in eastern Afghanistan on Friday, a U.S. military statement said.2008 November 15, “U.S.: Afghan insurgent leader captured”, in CNN, archived from the original on 22 Jan 2009. From the entry insurgent
  • They were on their way to Tongde county in Qinghai province, a Tibetan area in the northwest of the country, when they were detained.2008 October 2, Dinah Gardner, “Enemy of the state”, in South China Morning Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 13 Jun 2014. From the entry Tongde
  • The 16 crew members on board were detained for seven days by the garrisoned troops and were only released on 8 May.1990 May 31 [1990 May 30], “Incidents of Kuomintang Troops Shooting at and Towing Away Fishing Boats Along the Coast of Fujian Province…. From the entry Gangwei
  • Two Dutch journalists entering the country were detained at JFK International Airport March 30 because they openly declared that they were homosexuals.1981 April 11, Philip Shehadi, “Dutch Gays Come To NY, Protest Immigration Laws”, in Gay Community News, page 1. From the entry exclusion
  • The captain of a suspected “shadow fleet” oil tanker detained off the coast of France will go on trial in February accused of failing to cooperate with authorities.2025 October 3, Miranda Bryant, “Captain of oil tanker linked to Russia’s ‘shadow fleet’ to go on trial in France”, in The Guardian, →ISSN. From the entry shadow fleet
  • The store manager, a woman in her 50s, saw Sasaki pocket the condoms and detained him at the entrance to the store, while another employee called police.2023, 85-year-old man arrested for stealing condoms from convenience store. From the entry pocket
  • In a statement, it said the man, whom it did not identify, had been detained Sunday on suspicion of entering South Korea illegally by sea from China.2023 August 24, John Yoon, “Escape China by Jet Ski? A Dissident Is Said to Have Planned It for Years”, in The New York Times, →ISSN…. From the entry Incheon
  • Hong Kong police said they had detained two foreign men during what police there call a "dispersal operation" against a group of demonstrators gathered in Tuen Mun, Reuters reported.2019 November 15, Melissa Van Brunnersum, “Two German citizens detained in Hong Kong”, in Deutsche Welle, archived from the original on 15…. From the entry Tuen Mun

Meaning of detain

  1. verb To keep something from proceeding or coming to completion; to delay.
  2. verb To keep someone from proceeding by holding them back or making claims on their attention.
  3. verb To keep back or from; to withhold.

Full definition of detain

Questions about detain in a sentence

How do you use detain in a sentence?
Detain is used as a verb. For example: “He was detained late Tuesday after deboarding a British Airways flight from London.”
What is a short sentence with detain?
“The suspect’s detaining lasted several hours.”
What does detain mean?
Detain means to keep something from proceeding or coming to completion; to delay.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: detain (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use detain in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/detain. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.