State v. Cox’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 12 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 14 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““. . . if bodily harm is in any way inflicted upon the person or persons so kidnaped, said person or persons so guilty of the above-mentioned acts or act, shall, on conviction, be deemed guilty of kidnaping in the first degree and be punished by death or by confinement and hard labor in the penitentiary for life, if the kidnaped person has been harmed, or by imprisonment in the penitentiary for not less than twenty (20) years if the kidnaped person is unharmed. If there is a jury trial the jury shall determine which punishment shall be inflicted. If there is a plea of guilty the. court shall determine which punishment shall be inflicted, and in doing so shall hear evidence: . . .” (Emphasis added.)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. State v. Bethea

2. ““. . . For the trial court to include the punishment element in the verdict form as it was submitted to the jury, to be signed and returned as its verdict, constituted a defect as fatal as it would have been for the ransom element to have been so submitted. Here we not only have no evidence of ransom but all the uncontradicted evidence is that ransom did not enter the picture at all. By the same token, the element of unharmed, did not enter the picture.” (pp. 503, 504.)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Cox v. State