Mosby v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

10 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 10 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “When photographs are helpful to explain testimony, they are ordinarily admissible. Further, the mere fact that a photograph is inflammatory or is cumulative is not, standing alone, sufficient reason to exclude it. Even the most gruesome photographs may be admissible if they assist the trier of fact in any of the following ways: by shedding light on some issue, by proving a necessary element of the case, by enabling a witness to testify more effectively, by corroborating testimony, or by enabling jurors to better understand the testimony. Other acceptable purposes are to show the condition of the victims’ bodies, the probable type or location of the injuries, and the position in which the bodies were discovered. Absent an abuse of discretion, this court will not reverse a trial court for admitting photographs into evidence.”

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

2. “|iagruesome though the challenged photographs may have been and arguably cumulative in some instances, they were reviewed by the trial court and served to assist the trier of fact in understanding the testimony. For those reasons, their introduction into evidence did not constitute an abuse of discretion on the part of the trial court.”

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