133 Md. App. 173 - Sydnor v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

9 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 9 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “It is generally well recognized that a defendant is entitled to instructions on the law when generated by the evidence and not covered by instructions actually given. Patterson v. State, 356 Md. 677, 683 , 741 A.2d 1119 (1999); Ware v. State, 348 Md. 19, 58 , 702 A.2d 699 (1997); see also Md. Rule 4-325(c) (2000). Appellant asserts that the trial judges’C ] departure from the recommended language in the pattern jury instructions resulted in the possibility that the jury rejected his claim of self-defense because it erroneously believed he had a duty to retreat. In general, we have favored implementation of the Maryland Pattern Jury Instructions: Nevertheless, we say for the benefit of trial judges generally that the wise course of action is to give instructions in the form, where applicable, of our Maryland Pattern Jury Instructions. Those instructions have been put together by a group of distinguished judges and lawyers who almost amount to a “Who’s Who” of the Maryland Bench and Bar. Many of these instructions have been passed upon by our appellate courts. Green v. State, 127 Md.App. 758, 771 , 736 A.2d 450 (1999). As the State points out, however, deviation from the recommended language in the pattern jury instructions does not per se constitute error. We explained in Green v. State, 119 Md.App. 547, 562 , 705 A.2d 133 (1998), that, “When the evidence generates an issue that is not covered by a pattern instruction, we must count on the court to incorporate relevant and val”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 198 Md. App. 486 - Cousar v. State

2. “The purpose of Maryland Rule 8-131 is to allow the court to correct trial errors, obviating the necessity to retry cases had a potential error been brought to the attention of the trial judge. The Rule is also designed to prevent lawyers from “sandbagging” the judge and, in essence, obtaining a second “bite of the apple” after appellate review.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 199 Md. App. 483 - Dionas v. State