process server

English

Alternative forms

• process-server

Noun

process server (plural process servers)

1. (law enforcement) A deliverer of processes or summonses, the formal announcements of the beginning of a legal action; a huissier de justice or other equivalent position in other legal systems.

   The process server could not effect service of process because the defendant was nowhere to be found.

   • 1973, Paul Rock, Making People Pay, p. 162:

     The bailiff does not like to see himself as the brutal oppressor of the poor or as the agent of malicious creditors... This distinction between warrant officer and process server is not at all dissimilar to the gulf that divides the law officer and the peace officer in the police force... Warrant officers execute warrants whilst process servers distribute court summonses and cajole debtors.

Synonyms

• bailiff (chiefly UK); see also Thesaurus: police officer

Related terms

• process-serving

See also

• warrant officer