14 N.C. App. 236 - State v. Huntley’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

8 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 8 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “If, upon a proceeding to revoke probation or a suspended sentence, a defendant wishes to rely upon his inability to make payments as required by its terms, he should offer evidence of his inability for consideration by the judge. Otherwise, evidence establishing that defendant has failed to make payments as required by the judgment may justify a finding by the judge that defendant’s failure to comply was willful or was without lawful excuse. We disapprove the principle announced in Foust, supra, and followed in Huntley and Neal, supra. In the case presently under review, the defendant offered evidence which tended to show that he was unavoidably without the means to make payments as required by his probationary judgment. The trial judge, as the finder of the facts, is not required to accept defendant’s evidence as true. However, in this case, it is not clear whether the trial judge proceeded under an erroneous assumption that the fact of failure to comply required revocation of probation, or whether he considered defendant’s evidence and found that defendant had offered no evidence worthy of belief to justify a finding of a legal excuse for failure to comply with the judgment. Obviously, defendant is entitled to have his evidence considered and evaluated. Because it appears that this was not done, the order revoking probation is vacated and the cause is remanded for a new hearing upon the Report of the Probation Officer and the Bill of Particulars.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 43 N.C. App. 727 - State v. Smith