Fincher v. Rhyne’s Empirical Analysis
1965
Citation profile
4 federal appellate · 27 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 31 later decisions — most recently April 2010 · most notably Arnold IV v. Eastern Air Lines Inc (1982), Cates v. Wilson (1987)
4 federal appellate · 27 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 Greene v. Charlotte Chemical Laboratories, Inc. · Faizan v. Grain Dealers Mutual Insurance Company · Taylor v. Green · Jordan v. Maynard · Luttrell v. . Hardin
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 31 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The existence of insurance covering defendant’s liability in a negligence case is irrelevant to the issues involved. It has no tendency to prove negligence or the quantum of damages. It suggests to the jury that the outcome of the case is immaterial to defendant and the insurer is the real defendant and will have to pay the judgment. It withdraws the real defendant from the case and leads the jury “to regard carelessly the legal rights” of the real defendant. “No circumstance, a court has said, is more surely calculated to cause a jury to render a verdict against a defendant, without regard to the sufficiency (weight) of the evidence, than proof that the person against whom such verdict is sought is amply protected by indemnity insurance.” 56 A.L.R. 1422 .”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“[w]here testimony is given, or reference is made, indicating directly and as an independent fact that defendant has liability insurance, it is prejudicial, and the court should, upon motion therefor aptly made, withdraw a juror and order a mistrial. But there are circumstances in which it is sufficient for the court, in its discretion, because of the incidental nature of the reference, to merely instruct the jury to disregard it (citations omitted).”
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.