stitch up

Verb

stitch up (third-person singular simple present stitches up, present participle stitching up, simple past and past participle stitched up)

1. To join or close by sewing.
   • To make Capons […] [S]ome for this Purpoſe make it their Buſineſs after Harveſt-time to go to Markets for buying up Chickens, and between Michaelmas and All-hollantide caponize the Cocks, when they have got large enough to have Stones [i.e., testes] of ſuch a Bigneſs that they may be pulled out...1750, W[illiam] Ellis, The Country Housewife's Family Companion: Or Profitable Directions for Whatever Relates to the Management and Good Œconomy of the Domestick Concerns of a Country Life...
   • My second poem is a metrical advertisement of all Lord Byron's works; and for drawing it up, Mr Murray ought, I am sure, to be grateful to me, for it will save him I know not what in paper and printing, as there is little doubt of its being got by heart by all those for whom he stitches up his...1822 February, “Blaise Fitztravesty” [pseudonym], “Another Ladleful from the Devil's Punch Bowl”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume XI, number LXI, Edinburgh: William Blackwood, Edinburgh...
2. To fabricate (e.g. a legal case).
   • “They warn me that I should not go to far and threaten to stitch up a case against me if I do.”, he said2008, (Please provide the book title or journal name)
   • […] Netanyahu said police and prosecutors had conspired to “stitch up” a case against him […]2014, Buckingham, N. (2014). Murder in the Cotswolds. United States: Belgrave House. “But if you could somehow stitch up a case against me that would be fine with you, right?” 2020...
3. (Australia, UK, slang) To maliciously or dishonestly incriminate someone; to set up (in the sense trap or ensnare)
   • […] everyone knew the score, that he was being conned, used by business interests, the sort of scum we hated. It wasn't meant in a bad way, though, just that we could see he was being stitched up.2000, John King, Human Punk, London: Jonathan Cape, →ISBN, page 282
   • You might think policing in the 1970s was different to policing today. […] However, some things haven't changed all that much particularly if you were 18 at the time as my correspondent, who we'll call Geoff, found. The sad fact is that you never forget being stitched-up and the experience can...2015, Roger Williams, “1970s Stitch-ups”, in Rough Justice: Citizens' Experiences of Mistreatment and Injustice in the Early Stages of Law Enforcement, Sherfield on Loddon, Hook, Hampshire: Waterside...
4. (Australia, slang) To prank, trick, or deceive (a person), whether or not malice is intended.
   • Before coming on this trip I decided to brush up on my Italian, so I learnt one phrase: "Voglio andare veloce", which translates into "I want to go fast". I test it out on Matteo, undoubtedly butchering it with my Australian accent. He throws his head back and laughs a deep, booming, operatic...2019, Brendan Crew, “Pure. Lambo. Heaven.”, in The West Australian
5. (Australia, slang) To complete arrangements for (a situation), especially clandestinely or prematurely and for one's own benefit.
   • The strident deregulatory and anti-union policies of the Coalition have aided the Labor Government. Once a new variation of the Accord has been stitched up the Accord partners have expected that it would be endorsed by the commission.1995, Braham Dabscheck, The struggle for Australian industrial relations, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 51
   • So, by the time these enormous corporate manoeuvres had been stitched up, the Firm controlled, or had an interest in, over a hundred cinemas across Australia.2006, Michael and Joan Tallis, “Celluloid and Ether”, in The Silent Showman: Sir George Tallis, the man behind the world's largest entertainment organisation of the 1920s, Kent Town, South Australia...