Restitution is the name given to a form of legal relief in which the plaintiff recovers something from the defendant that belongs, or should belong, to the plaintiff. Restitution, which is related to the word "restore", is in effect a technical term for a legal process by which one obtains something to which one has a right and is opposed to the remedy of damages where one recovers the amount that one has lost because of a defendant's wrongdoing. In the Common Law the action of ejectment by which the plaintiff establishes his right to a parcel of land and recovers it is a classic example of a restitutionary action, although the plaintiff may also be able to recover in that action the damages that the plaintiff suffered while the land was in the possession of the defendant. This article is about law in society. ... A plaintiff, also known as a claimant, or a complainant is the party who initiates a lawsuit (also known as an action) before a court. ... A defendant is any party who is required to answer the complaint of a plaintiff in a civil lawsuit before a court, or any party who has been formally charged or accused of violating a criminal statute. ... A right is the power or privilege to which one is justly entitled or a thing to which one has a just claim. ... This article concerns the common-law legal system, as contrasted with the civil law legal system; for other meanings of the term, within the field of law, see common law (disambiguation). ... Ejectment is in the common law the name given to the civil action to recover the possession of and title to land. ... In economics, land comprises all naturally occurring resources, such as geographical locations, mineral deposits, and even portions of the electromagnetic spectrum. ...

The term restitution is applied most often to a case where the plaintiff recovers the amount by which a defendant was enriched by some form of unjust enrichment; thus, for example, if a thief steals a horse from the plaintiff that is worth $20 and sells it for $30 to someone else, the plaintiff has a choice between a cause of action against the thief for $20 damages based on the wrong---or tort---committed by the defendant and one for $30 based on the plaintiff's right to recover the amount by which the defendant was unjustly enriched. And the plaintiff also has a restitutionary cause of action to recover the horse or its value from the buyer, who cannot acquire good title to the horse by purchasing it from a thief who had no title to it. If the thief is judgement-proof or cannot be found, as is often the case, then the restitutionary action against the buyer will be the plaintiff's best option but that cause of action is obviously not based on a theory of unjust enrichment. In civil law, unjust enrichment means one party has conferred a benefit upon another party with the expectation he would be compensated for doing so, but has not received compensation equal to the value of the benefit conferred. ... Binomial name Equus caballus Linnaeus, 1758 The Horse (Equus caballus) is a sizeable ungulate mammal, one of the seven modern species of the genus Equus. ... In the law, a cause of action is a recognized kind of legal claim that a plaintiff pleads or alleges in a complaint to start a lawsuit. ... In the common law, a tort is a civil wrong for which the law provides a remedy. ... Title is a legal term for an owners interest in a piece of property. ...