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Step into the shoes of a dramatic prosecution lawyer. Select ALL the verb phrases that correctly complete her fiery closing statement.
"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the defendant has consistently _____ the rules of this fine institution!"
The correct answers are scoffed at, rebelled against, and dispensed with.
Prepositional verbs consist of a verb and a specific preposition that must precede its object. Scoff at, rebel against, and dispense with are all perfectly valid prepositional verbs that fit this context.
The distractors are tricky because they sound similar, but flout and disregard are transitive verbs. They take direct objects without any prepositions (e.g., flouted the rules, disregarded the rules). Adding a preposition to them makes the sentence grammatically incorrect!