2. To assist someone to do something; especially, something illegal: "The criminal was abetted (supported) by his brother."
3. To help someone commit a crime, including planning the crime and helping the person to escape from the police, if it is necessary.
The term abet comes from Old French abeter, "to incite, to tease, or to bait another person.
Abet comes from the baiting of wild animals or the ancient sport of bear baiting, and the English language has now taken this violent word meaning and applied it to people rather than to animals.
This term goes far back to an old Teutonic origin that conjures up a picture of hardy men going to the chase with their packs of hunting dogs. Our English verb bite appeared long ago in a Low German derivative betan, meaning "to cause to bite, to make bite", as, to make dogs bite the bear, and so to send them out to hunt the bear.
Icelandic beita meant "to feed, to make bite", and also "to hunt" with dogs. The French adopted both the sport and the Teutonic name for it, making the Old French verb beter, meaning "to bait" a bear, and abeter, "to excite, to incite", which we have taken into English as abet. No longer applied to the hunt, it now means to encourage or to incite people, usually in an evil enterprise.
This is considered to be a lawyer redundancy since abet means the same thing as aid, which lends credence to the old rumor that lawyers used to be paid by the word as illustrated by the statements shown below.
To help, assist, or to facilitate the commission of a crime, to promote the accomplishment thereof, to help in advancing or bringing it about, or to encourage, counsel, or to incite as to its commission.
It comprehends all assistance rendered by words, acts, encouragement, support, or presence, actual or constructive, to render assistance if necessary.