Ward v. State’s Empirical Analysis
1980
Citation profile
40 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 42 later decisions — most recently July 1999 · most notably Penagraph v. State (1981), Grunsfeld v. State (1992)
40 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 Brown v. State · Hart v. State · Childs v. State · Aldrighetti v. State · Kennedy v. State
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 42 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"The general rule is that, as part of its cross-examination, the State is permitted to ask the character witness if he has heard of a specific act of misconduct. However, the State may not ask whether the witness had personal knowledge of the act, nor may the question be framed so as to imply that the act has actually been committed. The State, as a prerequisite for asking the question, must have a good faith belief that the act actually occurred. Hart v. State, 447 S.W.2d 944 (Tex.Cr.App.1970); Stewart v. State, 148 Tex.Cr.R. 480 , 188 S.W.2d 167 (1945). [Footnote omitted]. * * * * * * The only requirement is that the act be inconsistent with the character trait about which the witness has testified. See Pace v. State, 398 S.W.2d 123 (Tex. Cr.App.1965). * * * * * * It should be kept in mind that the purpose of the ross-examination is not to discredit the person on whose behalf the witness is testifying, but rather, the purpose is to affect the weight of the witness' testimony."”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Johnson v. State“Appellant may not have a witness testify about his good character traits but avoid `placing his reputation in evidence' simply by not specifically asking whether appellant enjoyed a good reputation in the community.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Schumaker v. State
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.