Edwards v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

16 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 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[T]he purpose of the privilege is to permit a patient to communicate freely with his physician about his disease and to prevent physicians from disclosing the infirmities of their patients. Mutual Life insurance Company v. Owen, 111 Ark. 554 , 164 S.W. 720 (1914). Neither reason has the slightest relevancy here. Edwards, who did not testify or offer any witnesses at the trial below, obviously had no basis for communicating with Dr. Baker about his disease, because he knew perfectly well that he had none. To permit one in such a situation to feign injury and then exclude the doctor’s testimony would enable a criminal to conceal by deliberate falsehood the most trustworthy evidence of his offense. As we said in the Wimberly case, supra: ‘It could not have been intended by the Legislature that... the Act should be the means of protecting a criminal from just punishment.’”

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

2. ““In some states such statutes have been construed to apply only to civil cases; other courts have held them applicable to criminal trials as well. See, for example, State v. Betts, Ore. 384 P. 2d 198 (1963), and State v. Sullivan, Wash., 373 P. 2d 474 (1962). In the past we have assumed, without expressly declaring, that our statute does apply to criminal cases. Wimberly v. State, 217 Ark. 130 , 228 S.W. 2d 991 (1950); Cabe v. State, 182 Ark. 49 , 30 S.W. 2d 855 (1930); Burris v. State, infra.””

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