Strahan v. Webb’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

35 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 36 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The rule is founded on public policy, and is for the purpose of preventing litigants or the public from invading the privacy of the jury room, either during the deliberations of the jury or afterward. It is to prevent overzealous litigants and a curious public from prying . into deliberations which are intended to be, and should be, private, frank, and free discussions of the questions under consideration. Further, if after being discharged and mingling with the public, jurors are permitted to impeach verdicts which they have rendered, it would open the door for tampering with jurors and would place it in the power of a dissatisfied or corrupt juror to destroy a verdict to which he had deliberately given his assent under sanction of an oath. Testimony of the jurors to impeach their own verdict is excluded not because it is irrelevant tQ the matter in issue, but because experience has shown that it is more likely to prevent than to promote the discovery of the truth. Hence, the affidavit of a juror cannot be admitted to show anything relating to what passed in the jury room during the investigation of the cause, or the effect of a colloquy between the court and a juror, or the arguments made to a juror by a fellow juryman. The rule that a verdict cannot be impeached by the testimony of a juror is generally adhered to where it is sought to impeach a verdict on grounds of misconduct on the part of the juror or his fellow jurors, despite apprehension expressed in many cases that ”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Farm Bureau Mutual Insurance Co. of Arkansas v. Smith · State v. Osborn

2. ““Who can say how much mental anguish is worth * * * Unquestionably, the anguish and total loss of companionship will be felt far more in some cases than in others. There are individuals who really never completely reconcile themselves to the loss of a loved one, while, on the other hand, there are those who adjust themselves within a reasonable period of time, and are pretty well able to continue along in the usual pattern. ’ ’ In the instant case, we have three small boys who had been in close association with their father, probably a closer relationship than in the average family, due to the fact that there was no mother present to share in the companionship. Suddenly the one remaining parent was taken away from them — and in a violent manner. According to the evidence of Cecil Barnett, husband of Mrs. Clida Barnett, the boys’ grandmother, the younger boys cried many nights, and on several occasions awakened the Barnetts in the middle of the night, ‘ ‘ There’s been a many of nights that me and my wife would go to bed, pick them up and take them in and love them and talk to them.” The witness stated that Ferrell, one of the twins, had been under a doctor’s care due to extreme nervousness. The boys testified that their father was good to them, and would take them fishing, swimming, and to the picture show. Mrs. Barnett stated, “He took the boys everywhere he went when he wasn’t working, and they were not in school. If he went anywhere, they were with him, because he didn’t le”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Mode v. Barnett

3. “A juror cannot be examined to establish a ground for a new trial; except it be to establish, as a ground for a new trial, that the verdict was made by lot.”

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