State v. Patterson’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

22 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 22 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Even if the defendant meets his burden of establishing obvious error affecting substantial rights, the determination whether to correct the error lies within the discretion of the appellate court, and the court should exercise that discretion only if the error "seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings." State v. Olander , 1998 ND 50 , ¶ 16, 575 N.W.2d 658 (citations and quotation marks omitted). An alleged error does not constitute obvious error "unless there is a clear deviation from an applicable legal rule under current law." Id . at ¶ 14.”

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

2. “[T]he argument or other remarks of an attorney, except admissions and stipulations noted in the course of the trial, must not be considered by you as evidence. If counsel or I have made any comments or statements concerning the evidence which you find are not warranted by the evidence, you should wholly disregard them and rely upon your own recollection or observation. If counsel have made any statements as to the law which are not warranted by these instructions, you should wholly disregard those statements.”

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

3. “Even if the defendant meets his burden of establishing obvious error affecting substantial rights, the determination whether to correct the error lies within the discretion of the appellate court, and the court should exercise that discretion only if the error seriously affects the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings. An alleged error does not constitute obvious error unless there is a clear deviation from an applicable legal rule under current law.”

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