Ward v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 55 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 57 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The victim’s husband left for work at 6:00 a.m. on August 17, 1989. When he returned from work that evening, the 23-year-old victim, who was five months pregnant, was missing, along with her car. Their 22-month-old daughter was at home by herself. When the police arrived later that evening, many friends and relatives were present. At first, nothing appeared to be missing except for the victim and her car, but eventually it was learned that a telephone cord had been forcibly removed from the wall jack (leaving the plug), that most of the victim’s underwear had been removed from her dresser drawer, and that a quilt and a baby blanket had been taken. The victim’s car was discovered the next day on an unpaved logging road. Her body was discovered the day after that in a trash dump several miles away. Ligature marks around her wrists and ankles indicated she had been bound. Three of her ribs were broken and there were various bruises about her body. Her fetus was in a partially delivered condition. The mother died of asphyxiation resulting from her pharynx being stuffed with wadded-up paper towels. The death of the mother resulted in the destruction of the fetus. No clear suspects were developed for several months. Then, early in the morning of December 18, 1989, the defendant, wearing gloves and a stocking mask, broke into a Gordon County home and kidnapped a woman [Donna Rich] from her bed as she lay sleeping with her nine-year-old daughter. He drove the woman to an abandoned fa”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Ward v. Hall

2. “Depending upon the purpose for which the extrinsic offense is offered, the state may be required to prove a high degree of similarity between relevant characteristics of the extrinsic offenses and the charged crimes, or it may only have the burden of showing a logical connection between crimes which are essentially dissimilar.”

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

3. “`The ultimate issue in determining the admissibility of evidence of other crimes is not mere similarity but relevance to the issues in the trial of the case.' [Cit.]”

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