Porter v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 state decisions

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

1. “"The proper standard for determining whether juror misconduct warrants a new trial, as set out by this Court's precedent, is whether the misconduct might have prejudiced, not whether it actually did prejudice, the defendant. See Ex parte Stewart , 659 So.2d 122 (Ala. 1993) ; Campbell v. Williams , 638 So.2d 804 (Ala. 1994) ; Union Mortgage Co. v. Barlow , 595 So.2d 1335 (Ala. 1992), cert. denied , 506 U.S. 906 , 113 S.Ct. 301 , 121 L.Ed.2d 224 (1992). The 'might-have-been-prejudiced' standard, of course, casts a 'lighter' burden on the defendant than the actual-prejudice standard. See Tomlin v. State , supra, 695 So.2d [157,] at 170 [ (Ala. Crim. App. 1996) ]. ... "It is true that the parties in a case are entitled to true and honest answers to their questions on voir dire, so that they may exercise their peremptory strikes wisely. See Fabianke v. Weaver , 527 So.2d 1253 (Ala. 1988). However, not every failure to respond properly to questions propounded during voir dire 'automatically entitles [the defendant] to a new trial or reversal of the cause on appeal.' Freeman v. Hall , 286 Ala. 161 , 166, 238 So.2d 330 , 335 (1970) ; see also Dawson v. State , supra, [ 710 So.2d 472 ,] at 474 [ (Ala. 1997) ] ; and Reed v. State , supra [ 547 So.2d 596 (Ala. 1989) ]. As stated previously, the proper standard to apply in determining whether a party is entitled to a new trial in this circumstance is 'whether the defendant might have been prejudiced by a veniremember's failure to make a ”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Brownfield v. State