People v. Barnes’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

53 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 53 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Where an act is not in itself necessarily unlawful but becomes so by its circumstances, all the matters necessary to show its illegality must be stated in the indictment or information. (14 R. C. L. p. 175.) The charge as alleged must be an offense against the law, and if the facts alleged may all be true and yet constitute no offense the indictment is insufficient. (14 R. C. L. p. 174.) “. . . It is not sufficient to charge an offense in the language of the statute, alone, where by its generality it may embrace acts which it was not the intent of the statute to punish. Such facts must be alleged that, if proved, defendant cannot be innocent. (31 Corpus Juris, p. 713.) The pleader must either charge the offense in the language of the statute or specifically set forth the facts constituting it. But where the statute creating a new offense does not describe the act or acts which compose it, the pleader is required to state them specifically. (Johnson v. People, 113 Ill. 99 .)””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 30 Ill. App. 2d 57 - People v. Crosson