Villains a priest reformed (7)
I believe the answer is:
pirates
'villains' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both people as well as being plural nouns.
Maybe you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'a priest reformed' is the wordplay.
'reformed' indicates an anagram.
'a'+'priest'='apriest'
'apriest' is an anagram of 'PIRATES'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for pirates that I've seen before include "Buccaneers" , "Robbers on the high seas" , "Robbers at sea" , "Bad sailors" , "Copyright infringers" .)