161 W. Va. 46 - Watson v. Black’s Empirical Analysis
1977
Citation profile
30 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 30 later decisions — most recently October 2013 · most notably State v. Ahearn (1979), 172 W. Va. 656 - State v. Sheppard (1983)
30 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Chandler v. Warden Fretag · 157 W. Va. 640 - State v. Thomas · United States v. Calabro · Brown v. Craven · United States v. Young
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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“2. While an indigent defendant is entitled to competent counsel, he is not entitled to the appointment of any particular lawyer and may only reject representation by his court-appointed counsel for a good cause. 5. Good cause for the relief of a court-appointed counsel consists of: (1) a conflict of interest; (2) a complete breakdown in communication with court-appointed counsel after the exhaustion of good faith efforts to work with counsel; or, (3) an irreconcilable conflict which might lead to an unjust verdict.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage““Whenever it is suggested to the court that there is a conflict of interest, breakdown in communication, irreconcilable conflict, or any other cause for dissatisfaction by a defendant with his court-appointed lawyer, the trial court should hold a hearing on the matter and dispose of it on the record.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.