Watson v. State’s Empirical Analysis
1980
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 22 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 24 later decisions — most recently October 2013
2 federal appellate · 22 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 Villarreal v. State · Clark v. State · Garcia v. State · Fields v. State · Melton 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 24 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[T]here are three elements which must be considered in determining whether a witness is in fact competent to testify. The first is a capacity to observe intelligently at the time of the events in question. The other elements of capacity are recollection and narration, though the former is usually merged into the latter. The capacity to narrate involves on the one hand, both an ability to understand the questions asked and to frame intelligent answers and, on the other hand, a moral responsibility to tell the truth. If a person afflicted with a physical or mental disability possesses sufficient intelligence to receive correct impressions of events he sees, retains clear recollection of them and is able to communicate them through some means there is no reason for rejecting his testimony.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. Minor v. State · Lewis v. State“2. Children and other persons who, after being examined by the court, appear not to possess sufficient intellect to relate transactions with respect to which they are interrogated, or who do not understand the obligation of an oath.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Beavers 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.