Gaines v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 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 1 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““It appears from the record, herein, that the trial court did give the requested instruction defining when a homicide would be excusable, but inadvertently failed to include the last paragraph of the defendant’s requested instruction as follows: ‘Therefore, if you entertain a reasonable doubt as to whether or not Daisy Johnson’s death was excusable as defined above, then it is your duty to resolve such doubt in favor of the defendant and return a verdict of “Not Guilty” ’. He urges that the failure of the trial court to include in his definition of excusable homicide the last quoted paragraph of the instruction amounted to a failure to completely instruct the jury as to the law involved in said cause. “In determining this contention, we must necessarily look to the instructions as a whole. In instruction No. 2, we find that the court correctly and completely instructed the jury on the proposition of the necessity of finding the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the various degrees of homicide defined for them (i. e. murder, manslaughter in the first and second degree), before they could return a verdict of guilty. In instruction No. 6, the court defined manslaughter in the first degree and then included in the instruction: ‘Unless it is committed under such circumstances as to constitute excusable homicide.’ In instruction No. 13, the court, in making an application of manslaughter in the first degree to the facts involved, likewise concluded that instruction as f”

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