People v. Hill’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

41 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 44 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Whether the omission was inadvertent or intentional does not appear, although from the fact that that degree of the offense was covered by the charge, and that a form of verdict for manslaughter was furnished to the jury, it is highly probable that the omission was unintentional. However that may be, we do not ascribe any such effect to the omission as that suggested by defendant. The law makes it no part of the duty of the judge to furnish forms of verdict to the jury, but the latter are presumed to be able to formulate their own conclusions, and in practice most usually do so. Where, therefore, the jury has been properly instructed as to the different degrees of the offense, it must be presumed that if their conclusion called for a form of verdict with which they were not furnished, they would either ask for it or write one for themselves. It certainly could have no necessary tendency to preclude them from finding such verdict.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 189 Cal. App. 2d 254 - People v. Williams