Ferguson v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

5 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 5 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Ferguson’s demonstrated danger to the public outweighs the relatively poor prospect of rehabilitation revealed by his pri- or institutional commitments. Appellant was 18 years of age at the time of the robbery. He has no prior adult convictions, but in 1974 was adjudicated a delinquent child, following two incidents in which he stole cases of food from a store in Kodiak. At that time he was placed on probation. His probation was subsequently revoked on two occasions. In 1976, he was involved in a burglary, during which he carried a firearm, and was sent to the Lookout Mountain School in Colorado. . The probation officer’s report concluded that appellant has “demonstrated himself to be a very serious danger to society” and recommended “[t]ime to serve with no consideration of probation.” The report notes that appellant’s prior record while on probation was not good and that his previous stay in an institution had no significant effect on him. A psychiatric report, which was before the court at the time of sentencing, concluded: “This boy does not seem to have any treatable disorder and does not impress me as being motivated, at least not at this time to attempt any changes.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Ferguson v. State