25 Cal. 3d 283 - People v. Brigham’s Empirical Analysis
1979
Citation profile
8 federal appellate · 167 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 187 later decisions (3 by the Supreme Court) — most recently May 2021 · most notably Victor v. Nebraska (1994), 28 Cal. 3d 1 - Hovey v. Superior Court (1980)
8 federal appellate · 167 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 Anders v. California · In the Matter of Samuel Winship · Holland v. United States · 46 Cal. 2d 818 - People v. Watson · 17 Cal. 3d 24 - People v. Kelly
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 187 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“that state of the case which, after the entire comparison and consideration of all the evidence, leaves the minds of the jurors in that condition that they cannot say they feel an abiding conviction, to a moral certainty, of the truth of the charge.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“everything relating to human affairs, and depending on moral evidence, is open to some possible or imaginary doubt,”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“A variety of such formulations were tried, but with mixed success. In a number of cases the definition, although intended to help the jury understand the principle of proof beyond a reasonable doubt, had the unintended effect of weakening or nullifying the principle itself, and hence was prejudicially erroneous. Reversing the ensuing convictions, [the California Supreme Court] chose not to prohibit or even to discourage trial judges from enlarging upon the statutory principle; rather, the court urged them to instruct in terms of a particular definition of reasonable doubt that had received widespread judicial approval, i.e., the definition proposed by Chief Justice Shaw of Massachusetts in the case of Commonwealth v. Webster, (1850) 59 Mass. [ (5 Cush.) ] 295, 320.”
1 later decision 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.