Dowsey v. Wilkins’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

22 federal appellate · 5 district ·

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

1. ““The language requiring intent to deprive of equal protection, or equal privileges and immunities, means that there must be some racial, or perhaps otherwise class-based, invidiously discriminatory animus behind the conspirators’ action.” Griffin v. Breckenridge, 403 U.S. 88, 101-102 , 91 S.Ct. 1790, 1798 , 29 L.Ed.2d 338 (1971) (footnotes omitted). See also Dowsey v. Wilkins, 467 F.2d 1022 (5th Cir. 1972).”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Shore v. Howard · 430 F. Supp. 1274 - Perrotta v. Irizarry

2. “The Sheriff and Chief of Police contend that they acted only in an attempt to save Robberson’s life and thus are entitled to use their good faith as an absolute defense. This is an erroneous view of the law of false imprisonment. No matter how laudatory the motives of the Sheriff and the Chief of Police may have been, such motives alone are not sufficient to arm them with a privilege to detain and interrogate a citizen for hours, threaten him with jail unless he tells them what they want to know, and then attempt to prevent his leaving the place of interrogation and detention if there is no underlying right to deprive that person of his freedom. Pierson v. Ray, 386 U.S. 547 , 87 S.Ct. 1213 , 18 L.Ed.2d 288 (1967), held that an officer’s assertion of a reasonable good faith belief that he had probable cause to arrest created a jury issue in a Section 1983 action against him for false arrest and imprisonment. In reasoning to this result, the Supreme Court emphasized that actions under Section 1983 were analogous to tort actions and therefore a defense which would establish that no tortious wrong had in fact been committed was equally available in either type suit. This kind of good faith would be as applicable to a defendant in a Section 1983 action for false imprisonment unaccompanied by any claim of false arrest. However, mere good intentions which do not give rise to a reasonable belief that detention is lawfully required cannot justify false imprisonment whether the action ”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Bryan v. Jones

3. “Every person who, having knowledge of any of the wrongs conspired to be done, and mentioned in § 1985 of this title, are about to be committed, and having power to prevent or aid in preventing the commission of the same, neglects or refuses so to do, if such wrongful act be committed, shall be liable to the party injured, or his legal representatives, for all damages caused by such wrongful act, which such person by reasonable diligence could have prevented; and such damages may be recovered in an action on the case; and any number of persons guilty of such wrongful neglect or refusal may be joined as defendants in the action; and if the death of any party be caused by any such wrongful act in neglect, the legal representatives of the deceased shall have such action therefor, and may recover not exceeding $5,000.00 damages therein, for the benefit of the widow of the deceased, if there be one, and if there be no widow, then for the benefit of the next of kin of the deceased. But no action under the provisions of this section shall be sustained which is not commenced within one year after the cause of action has accrued.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 758 F. Supp. 342 - Proffitt v. United States