Phillips 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. “The appellant next assigns as error the refusal of the lower court to grant him the following instruction: The Court instructs the Jury that under the law, the defendant is a competent witness in his own behalf, and that the Jury has no right to disbelieve him merely because he is the defendant, and that his testimony is entitled to such weight, faith and credit as the Jury may think proper to give it. However, our research reveals that in the recent case of McNamee v. State, 313 So.2d 392 (Miss. 1975), this Court condemned the use of an instruction similar to the one in the case at bar and held that it was properly refused. The reasoning in McNamee, supra, was that to grant such an instruction would violate the rule against singling out witnesses and giving undue prominence to their testimony. Only in rare cases where the testimony of the defendant is the only direct testimony and where the prosecution is based upon circumstantial evidence will an instruction of this type be granted. See, e.g., McNamee v. State, supra; Dunbar v. State, 159 Miss. 603 , 132 So. 748 (1931) and McVay v. State, 26 So. 947 (Miss. 1900). In the case sub judice, the state's case was not based on circumstantial evidence. ( 374 So.2d at 826 ).”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Walters v. State · 387 So. 2d 101 - Gray v. State