In US legal cases, "John Doe", "Jane Roe", and similar names are used for pseudonymized legal parties.

For instance, the plaintiff in the famous abortion case Roe v. Wade was one Norma McCorvey, identified as "Jane Roe".

A group of unidentified people appearing as plaintiffs or defendants may be called a group of "Does", from the name John Doe.

The words doe and roe both refer to deer, which are common wild animals in North America — and as wild animals, represent an arbitrary unspecified person. A doe is a female deer; and while "roe" can also mean fish eggs, roe deer is a common European species of deer.