State v. Cole’s Empirical Analysis
2003
Citation profile
84 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 86 later decisions — most recently July 2025 · most notably State Ex Rel. Kalal v. Circuit Court for Dane County (2004), State v. Stenklyft (2005)
84 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 211 Wis. 2d 397 - State v. Setagord · State v. Leitner · 198 Wis. 2d 516 - State v. Williams · 104 Wis. 2d 414 - McGarrity v. Welch Plumbing Co. · 108 Wis. 2d 282 - State v. Morris
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 86 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“we are unable to clarify the intent of the legislature by resort to legislative history.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage“provides generally that ambiguous penal statutes should be interpreted in favor of the defendant.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage“[W]hen there is doubt as to the meaning of a criminal statute, a court should apply the rule of lenity and interpret the statute in favor of the accused.”
3 later decisions 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.