Stíhat

Stíhat is a Czech verb meaning to pursue, chase, or prosecute. In everyday usage it can refer to physically following someone or something, as in police trying to catch a suspect, or more broadly to striving to reach a goal or to keep up with a timetable. In legal contexts, stíhání denotes the act of pursuing a case or bringing someone to trial, with phrases such as zahájit stíhání (to initiate prosecution) and vést stíhání (to conduct prosecution).

Grammatical notes: Stíhat is imperfective, and its perfective counterpart is stihnout, which emphasizes completion or achievement of the action. This pair allows speakers to distinguish ongoing pursuit from a completed act, such as a finished attempt to catch up or finish a task. Present tense forms are: stíhám, stíháš, stíhá, stíháme, stíháte, stíhají. Past tense is formed with the auxiliary být, for example: stíhal, stíhala, stíhalo; stíhali, stíhaly. Future tense is analytic: budu stíhat, budeš stíhat, bude stíhat, budeme stíhat, budete stíhat, budou stíhat.

Examples of use: Policie stíhá podezřelého. Státní zástupce zahájil stíhání proti obviněnému. In non-legal contexts, stíhat can also appear in phrases referring to keeping up with duties or expectations, though the perfective stihnout is often used when the sense is “to manage to do something in time.”

See also: stíhání, stihnout.