412 So. 2d 758 - Green v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 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 2 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Now the term `available' in the connection in which we are using it does not mean merely available or accessible for the service of a subpoena, since any witness who may be found may be subpoenaed at the instance of either party to any cause. Quite to the contrary the `availability' of a witness to one or the other of the parties to an action depends either upon such party's superior means of knowledge of the existence and identity of the witness, or else upon the relationship of the witness to the party as the same would reasonably be expected to affect his personal interest in the outcome of the litigation and make it natural that he would be expected to testify in favor of the one party and against the other. In other words, a witness may properly be said to have been peculiarly `available' to one party to an action, so that upon that party's failure to have produced him in court an inference arises that his testimony would have been unfavorable, when such party had so superior an opportunity for knowledge of the witness, or there was such a community of personal interest between the party and the witness, as in ordinary experience would have made it reasonably probable that the witness would have been called to testify for such party except for the fact that it was known or feared that his testimony would be damaging rather than favorable.”

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