182 Md. App. 114 - Tate v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 36 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 38 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[q]uite often[,] a defendant’s optimal choice will be to remain silent, thus waiving his [or her] challenge to the inconsistent verdicts and accepting the conviction that may be inconsistent. A defendant, aware of his or her guilt, or the overwhelming evidence of guilt, of all of the crimes of which he or she stands charged, may choose to accept the jury’s lenity. A defendant may be wise to accept the inconsistent conviction and accompanying sentence, rather than look a gift horse in the mouth. If the defendant objects to the inconsistent verdicts, the jury, given a second chance, may choose to remedy the error in a manner [that is] not in the defendant’s favor.”

   5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Travis v. State · 233 Md. App. 630 - Ndunguru v. State

2. “A factually inconsistent verdict is one where a jury renders “different verdicts on crimes with distinct elements when there was only one set of proof at a given trial, which makes the verdict illogical.” Ashlee Smith, Comment, Vice-A-Verdict: Legally Inconsistent Jury Verdicts Should Not Stand in Maryland, 35 U. BALT. L. REV. 395, 397 n. 16 (2006). The feature distinguishing a factually inconsistent verdict from a legally inconsistent verdict is that a factually inconsistent verdict is merely illogical. By contrast, a legally inconsistent verdict occurs where a jury acts contrary to a trial judge’s proper instructions regarding the law. The difference between the two is perhaps best illustrated by examples from other jurisdictions. Assume a legally intoxicated or otherwise reckless driver causes a head-on collision, killing on impact the driver and passenger of the other car. The intoxicated driver is charged with two counts of vehicular homicide. The jury convicts the defendant of vehicular homicide as to the death of the driver of the other car, but finds the defendant not guilty of the same crime with regard to the death of the passenger. Such a result would constitute factually inconsistent verdicts. 405 Md. at. 35-36 [ 949 A.2d 619 ] (emphasis supplied). A legal inconsistency, by contrast, occurs when the crime for which a defendant is acquitted is, in its entirety, a lesser included offense within the greater inclusive offense for which a defendant is convicted. The co”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Travis v. State · 191 Md. App. 370 - OGUNDIPE v. State

3. “The distinction that the concurring opinion carefully points out between a true legal inconsistency and a mere factual inconsistency is indispensable to any reasonable application of Price v. State. Without that distinction the majority opinion could easily give rise to an epidemic of promiscuous inconsistency claims. (It probably will anyway, but the concurring opinion will at least help to contain the damage.)”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Travis v. State · 204 Md. App. 378 - Dickerson v. State