State v. Jones’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

49 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 51 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Initially, this Court held in State v. Burdette, 335 S.C. 34 , 515 S.E.2d 525 (1999), that Section 17-25-45 does not violate the separation of powers doctrine. We stated, “[ujnder the mandatory sentencing guidelines, the prosecutor can still choose not to pursue the triggering offenses or to plea the charges down to non-triggering offenses. Choosing which crime to charge a defendant with is the essence of prosecutorial discretion, not choosing which sentence the court shall impose upon conviction.” 335 S.C. at 40-41 , 515 S.E.2d at 528-529 . Further, we found the matter of sentencing if convicted of a triggering offense to be a matter within the province of the legislature.”

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

2. “It is questionable, in light of the United States Supreme Court’s opinion in Harmelin v. Michigan, whether the stringent three-factor Solem inquiry remains mandated in “cruel and unusual punishment” cases. However, we need not decide the matter here since, in our view, even the more stringent test of Solem is met in this case.”

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

3. “(A) ... [U]pon a conviction for a most serious offense as defined by this section, a person must be sentenced to a term of imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole if that person has one or more prior convictions for: (1) a most serious offense....”

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