Skell, as a stereotypical or archetypal designation, refers to a person who is homeless, vagrant or derelict. It is often used to connote such a person who is habitually engaged in small-time criminal activity, especially by one working as a con artist or panhandler.
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In its modern form, the use of skell as a slang term in the United States appears to date only from the 1970s, most especially from New York City. The word has sometimes been used by the police officer characters on the TV shows NYPD Blue, Third Watch, and Law and Order: SVU.
Possible origins for the word include:
The term is used several times in the film Miller's Crossing, especially in regard to the character Bernie Bernbaum.
Crow T. Robot refers to Michael J. Nelson as a skell in a sketch performed in episode 905 of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Ed Burns (Mickey) refers to Mike McGlone (Francis) as a skell in the movie She's the One.
Joe Pesci (Nicky Santoro) uses the term skell in his rant to Robert De Niro (Sam Rothstein) in the movie Casino.
Police Officer Smitty refers to Bender as a skell when he and his partner, URL, are undercover in Little Bitaly in the second-season episode of Futurama entitled Bender Gets Made.
Within the Law & Order television series, the term has been casually used by leading characters such as Det. Lenny Briscoe, Det. Elliot Stabler and Det. Mike Logan.
In the Third Watch television series, the term has been frequently used in casual conversation between the leading NYPD characters such as John 'Sully' Sullivan, Maurice 'Bosco' Boscorelli and others.