The United States v. Thomas Staats Junior’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

37 federal appellate · 20 district · 16 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 101 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Whoever shall falsely make, alter, forge, or counterfeit, or cause or procure to be falsely made, altered, forged, or counterfeited, or willingly aid, or assist in the false making, altering, forging, or counterfeiting, any deed, power of attorney, order, certificate, receipt, contract, or other writing, for the pur-post; of obtaining or receiving or of enabling any other person, either directly or indirectly, to obtain or receive from tlie- United States, or any of their officers or agents, any sum of money; or whoever shall utter or publish as true, or cause to be uttered or published as true, any such false, forged, altered, or counterfeited deed, power of attorney, order, certificate, receipt, contract, or other writing, with intent to defraud the United States, knowing the same to be false, altered, forged, or counterfeited; or whoever shall transmit to, or present at, or cause or procure to be transmitted to, or presented at, any office or officer of the Government of the United States, any deed, power of attorney, order, certificate, receipt, contract, or other writing, in support of, or in relation to, any account or claim, with intent to defraud the United States, knowing the same to be false, altered, forged, or counterfeited, shall be fined not more than one thousand dollars and imprisoned not more than ten years””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. United States v. Smith · Moskal v. United States

2. ““The only doubt that can be raised is whether the writing transmitted or presented to the commissioner in support of a claim for a pension should not, within the meaning of the statute, be an instrument forged or counterfeited in the technical sense of the term, and not one genuine as to the execution but false as it respects the facts embodied in it. * * * The case is within the mischief intended to be guarded against, and also within the words; and we think the considerations urged, founded upon the form and structure of the general provision, though plausible and calculated to excite doubt, not sufficient to take it out of them. A genuine instrument containing a false statement of facts, used in support of a claim, the party knowing it to be false, and using it with intent to defraud, presents a case not distinguishable in principle or in turpitude or in its mischievous effects from one in which every part of the instrument is fabricated; and, when the one is as fully within the words of the statute as the other, we may well suppose that it was intended to embrace it.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Dolan v. United States · 64 F. Supp. 467 - United States v. Tommasello

3. ““The court are of opinion that the offense charged in the indictment comes within the statute. The only doubt that can be raised is whether the writing transmitted or presented to the commissioner in support of the claim for a pension should not, within the meaning of the statute, be an instrument forged, or counterfeited, in the technical sense of the term, and not one genuine as to the execution, but false as it respects the facts embodied in it. “The instruments referred to in the first part of the section, the false making or forging of which, with the intent stated, is made an offense, probably are forged instruments in a strict technical sense; and there is force, therefore, in the argument that the subsequent clause, making the transmission or presentation of deeds or other writings to an officer of the government a similar offense, had reference to the same description of instruments.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. United States v. Smith