you can beat the rap, but you can't beat the ride en · X
Etymology
See rap (“record of arrest and prosecution”). The "ride" is being taken away in the back of a police car. Already known as a saying in 1973.
Meanings
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(informal) You can't escape the inconvenience and/or cost of the legal process even if you are innocent and the charges are ultimately dropped or you get acquitted.
"The charge?" Chalmers rattled off a list of offenses, a few of which turned Prance's already defeated mood more solemn. "Give me a break," he said. "You can always beat the rap, but you can't beat the ride. Captain, you are going for a goddamn long ride."
2022, Peter Farris, The Devil Himself: A Novel, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN:But you get to the point of you can beat the rap, but you cannot beat the ride, and that is really a good description I think of a lot of litigation, and what the patent trolls rely on. All right, it is going to be hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars to hire a lawyer. I can beat the rap, but I am going to end with a million-dollar ride.
2015 March 25, United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Judiciary. Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet, Patent Reform: Protecting American Innovators and Job Creators from Abusive Patent Litigation, U.S. Government Publishing Office, page 56:The jury might acquit you - you could beat the rap. But hang on tight, Rick. You're not going to beat the ride.
2015, Barbara Parker, Criminal Justice, Open Road Media, →ISBN: