State v. Spaulding’s Empirical Analysis
1979
Citation profile
6 federal appellate · 70 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 78 later decisions — most recently June 2019 · most notably State v. Braxton (2000), State v. Pinch (1982)
6 federal appellate · 70 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 Gregg v. Georgia · Witherspoon v. Illinois · Jurek v. Texas · California v. Curry · State v. Wilkerson
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 78 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[t]o be entitled to an instruction on self-defense, ... [a] defendant ha[s] to present evidence tending to show (1) he was free from fault in the matter, and (2) it was necessary, or reasonably appeared to be necessary, to kill in order to protect himself from death or great bodily harm.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. State v. Mills · State v. Boykin““(1) it appeared to defendant and he believed it to be necessary to kill the deceased in order to save himself from death or great bodily harm; and (2) defendant’s belief was reasonable in that the circumstances as they appeared to him at that time were sufficient to create such a belief in the mind of a person of ordinary firmness; and (3) defendant was not the aggressor in bringing on the affray, i.e., he did not aggressively and willingly enter into the fight without legal excuse or provocation; and (4) defendant did not use excessive force, i.e., did not use more force than was necessary or reasonably appeared to him to be necessary under the circumstances to protect himself from death or great bodily harm.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage“if there is any evidence in the record . . . that it was necessary or reasonably appeared to be necessary to kill his adversary in order to protect himself from death or great bodily harm.”
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.