Cloman v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

43 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 43 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “`It requires that there should be time and opportunity for deliberate thought, and that after the mind has conceived the thought of taking life, the thought is meditated upon and a deliberate determination formed to do the act. This being done, it makes no difference how soon afterwards the fatal resolve is carried into execution. There need be no specific period of time between the formation of the intention in the mind to kill and the killing so long as there was some time for deliberation.'”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Young v. State · Key v. State

2. “1 Wharton's Criminal Law and Procedure by Anderson p. 563, et seq., states the rules of law on premeditation as follows: Deliberation and premeditation involve a prior intention or design to do the act in question. It is not necessary, however, that this intention should have been conceived at any particular period of time, and it is sufficient that only a moment elapsed between the plan and its execution, as long as the jury can conclude that there was some appreciable interval however small. It is sufficient that with the intention to commit the act the appreciation of the result likely to follow appeared to the defendant at the time the act was committed, or that he understood and contemplated the consequences of his act. A killing may be the result of prompt and speedy execution of a hasty or immediate resolution and yet have been done with express malice. When a design is once formed, the haste with which it is put into execution in no way affects or modifies the degree of guilt incurred. Such design may have existed for only an instant before the commission of the crime. [footnotes omitted] Whether premeditation is present in a given case is a question of fact to be determined by the jury from all the circumstances of the case, such as the use of a deadly weapon upon an unarmed victim; * * * (footnotes omitted)”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Young v. State

3. “One of the leading cases evoking that principle is Commonwealth v. Stelma, 327 Pa. 317 , 192 A. 906, 908 (1937), which says in part: “ * * * The defendant’s argument that the intention to rob originated subsequent to the assault upon the deceased need not be seriously considered in view of the verdict of the jury. Moreover, even though such were the case, it is immaterial when the design to rob was conceived, if the homicide occurred while defendant was perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate a robbery. Where the killing occurs in the perpetration of any of the crimes specifically named in the statute referred to, the intent to kill is immaterial. * * * ” Stelma has been followed in Commonwealth v. Slavik, 437 Pa. 354 , 261 A.2d 583 (1970), in which the court said in effect that if a homicide occurs in the perpetration of a robbery, a conviction of first degree murder will be sustained “regardless of when the design to rob was conceived.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Hightower v. State of Wyoming