People v. Cagle’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 2 district · 23 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 28 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The second condition [for a valid investigatory stop] requires a two-fold inquiry: the court must first determine the officer’s actual purpose in making the search, and then determine whether this purpose was reasonable. Where an officer conducts an investigatory stop, an accompanying search upon less than probable cause is permissible solely for the purpose of discovering weapons. The officer must in fact entertain this purpose at the time of the search; the delicate balance that the rule of Terry strikes between the officer’s protection and the suspect’s privacy would be skewed if an officer were permitted to search for evidence and rationalize it only after the fact as a search for weapons.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. People v. Lagrutta · People v. Novitskiy

2. “Assuming that it can be shown on remand that Officer Cillo’s purpose in conducting the search was in fact to look for weapons, we believe that the scope and character of the search accorded with such a purpose. The passenger’s furtive conduct in bending down in his seat after Officer Cilio turned on his overhead lights would have warranted a reasonable belief that the passenger had a weapon beneath his seat, thus justifying a weapons search in that area.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. People v. Cagle

3. “only then may the court conclude that the purpose was reasonable.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. People v. Smith