State v. Gregory’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 10 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 13 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Neither was there any impermissibly suggestive procedure which induced Mrs. Townley’s lineup identification of appellant, or her subsequent in-court identification. After appellant’s arrest, Mrs. Townley viewed a lineup of four men and listened to their voices. She tentatively and cautiously identified appellant as her assailant. After the lineup, Detective Luther took a Polaroid photograph of appellant by himself. After Mrs. Townley had examined the photograph, she was confirmed in her identification of appellant. It made her “doubly sure” of the identification, she testified. Nothing in the above-described police procedure required the suppression either of the lineup identification or of the in-court identification. It is to be noted that the Polaroid color photograph of the appellant was made and shown to Mrs. Townley only after she had tentatively identified him. It is regrettable that she had been informed by the police before she viewed the lineup that “they had the right man this time” (an earlier suspect, the registered owner of the car used by the criminal, had proved not to be the culprit), but it is implicit in the lineup procedure that among the persons in the lineup is one who is suspected by the police as the perpetrator of the crime. State v. Dayton, 535 S.W.2d 479, 488 (Mo.App.1976). However, that did not require the trial court to suppress the pre-trial identification, and the trial court’s denial of the motion to suppress will not be disturbed on this appea”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gregory v. Wyrick

2. “On September 8, 1980, at approximately 9 o’clock a.m., a black man (later identified as the defendant) came to the door of the residence of 83-year-old Lillian Townley in Kansas City. Pretending to be responding to a home repair call, he presented a card and stated he was from American Home Repair. As Mrs. Town-ley opened the door to return his card, he forced his way into her house. He stole some money and a television set, and attempted to rape her. He failed in the last-mentioned undertaking to achieve penetration. Before the criminal left the house, Mrs. Townley managed to escape from the cords with which she had been bound and fled from her basement to a next-door neighbor’s house. The neighbor, Mrs. Tonjes, called the police. Detective McKinnie actually arrived in time to see the robber enter a car in front of the Townley house. He noted the license number of the car and got a good view of the man. By the time the man had been identified to McKinnie as the robber, he had driven away. McKinnie later determined that the car was registered to one Edward Thomas. He located Thomas and discovered that he was not the man he had seen at the car in front of the Townley house. The owner told Detective McKinnie that he had lent his car to the appellant. Appellant was arrested and identified both by Mrs. Townley and by McKinnie as the perpetrator. [ 630 S.W.2d at 608 ]”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gregory v. Wyrick

3. “Aside from the pre-trial lineup identification, Mrs. Townley had a sufficient opportunity to observe her assailant at close range at the time of the offense, and thus had an independent basis for her in-court identification. Neil v. Biggers, 409 U.S. 188,199 , 93 S.Ct. 375, 382 , 34 L.Ed.2d 401 (1972); State v. Higgins, 592 S.W.2d 151, 160 (Mo. banc 1979), appeal dismissed 446 U.S. 902 , 100 S.Ct. 1825 , 64 L.Ed.2d 254 (1980). [ 630 S.W.2d at 609 ]”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gregory v. Wyrick