State v. Alto’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 district · 12 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 14 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[P]lacing the burden of proof on the state beyond a reasonable doubt in criminal cases reflects our belief that it is worse tha[t] an innocent man be jailed than that a guilty man go free.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Shaw v. State, Department of Administration · Smart v. State

2. “a fundamental value determination . . . that it is far worse to convict an innocent man than to let a guilty man go free.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Shaw v. State, Department of Administration · Smart v. State

3. “C.R.S. § 16-8-101(1) ... A person who is so diseased or defective in mind at the time of the commission of the act as to be incapable of distinguishing right from wrong with respect to that act. But care should be taken not to confuse such mental disease or defect with moral obliquity, mental depravity, or passion growing out of anger, revenge, hatred, or other motives, and kindred evil conditions, for when the act is induced by any of these causes the person is accountable to the law. (2) The term "diseased or defective in mind”, as used in subsection (1) of this section, does not refer to an abnormality manifested only by repeated criminal or otherwise antisocial conduct.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Glatz v. Kort