Harbin v. Harbin’s Empirical Analysis
1986
Citation profile
10 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 10 later decisions — most recently September 2016
10 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on 461 So. 2d 821 - Matter of Von Goyt · 475 So. 2d 568 - McKinney v. ALABAMA DEPT. OF PENSIONS & SEC. · 456 So. 2d 330 - Pickett v. State · Keith v. Keith · 41 Ala. App. 570 - Lumber Fabricators, Inc. v. Appalachian Oak Flooring & Hardwood Corp.
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.
“As to the mother’s contention that the admission of the hospital records violated her psychiatrist-patient privilege pursuant to section 34-26-2, Code of Alabama 1975, we disagree. Section 34-26-2, Code 1975, does provide for confidential relations and communications between licensed psychologists or psychiatrists and their patients. We have held, however, that “where the issue of the mental state of a party to a custody suit is clearly in controversy, and a proper resolution of the custody issue requires disclosure of privileged medical records, the psychologist-patient privilege must yield.” Matter of Von Goyt, 461 So.2d 821 (Ala.Civ.App.1984) (citations omitted). In the instant case the father’s counter-petition for custody modification clearly placed the issue of the mother’s mental state in question. Thus, it became the court's duty to determine whether a proper resolution of the custody issue required disclosure of the mother’s medical records. This the court clearly did by holding an in camera hearing, with all parties represented, to decide whether the asserted privilege and confidentiality of the records should yield to the issue of Nicholas’s best interests and well-being. After the hearing the court determined that the privilege would not prevent the admission of the hospital records into evidence.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Sussman v. Sussman“the proper resolution of the custody issue requires disclosure of privileged *Page 1058 medical records.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.