People v. Harrington’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

15 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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The returns which plaintiffs in error promised were many times larger than returns ordinarily expected from legitimate undertakings, and the natural inference to be drawn by any well-informed person would be that the proposition offered by plaintiffs in error was fraudulent. Plaintiffs in error represented to their customers that they had connections with Wall street and that they made these extraordinary returns by dealing in stocks and real estate. If these statements were true plaintiffs in error could have proven their truth. With nothing but the description of the scheme before them the jury were fully warranted in believing that the statements were false. The confidence game statute covers any scheme whereby a swindler wins the confidence of his victim and then swindles him of his money or property by taking advantage of the confidence fraudulently obtained. If the transaction is, in fact, a swindling operation, it is immaterial that the form assumed is that of a lawful business transaction.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 238 Ill. App. 369 - People v. Bischoff