Pitts v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

4 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 4 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “is probably better called the “assumption of innocence” in that it describes our assumption that, in the absence of contrary facts, it is to be assumed that any person’s conduct upon a given occasion was lawful.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Williams v. State

2. “Most courts insist on the inclusion of the phrase in the charge to the jury, despite the fact that at that point it consists of nothing more than an amplification of the prosecution’s burden of persuasion.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Williams v. State

3. “may mislead the jury into believing that the protections traditionally afforded by the presumption of innocence, for some unexplained reason, do not apply in the particular case at bar.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Williams v. State