State v. Byrd’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 11 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 14 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““As a general rule, it is the duty of an officer in making an arrest to state his official character and the cause of the arrest, exhibiting his warrant, if he has one; but the failure to take these precautions does not justify homicide or even physical resistance by the party arrested without inquiry on his part as to the authority for his arrest. In State v. Anderson, 19 S. C. L. (1 Hill) 327, 345, which is generally regarded a case of great authority, a private citizen was killed while attempting to arrest Anderson in this State for a murder committed in Georgia. Judge O’Neall says : ‘The qualification to the general rule to which I have alluded is that, where the party making the arrest inform the prisoner of their intention to arrest, or actually make it, and the prisoner makes no demand of the cause, it is not necessary to state it. After Col. Martin informed the prisoner that he and his party were there to arrest him, to avail himself of his want of knqwledge of the cause of the intended arrest, he ought to have demanded it. His failure to do so, as well as the facts to which I have already adverted,«deprive him of any benefit of this defense.’ ””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. State v. Shaw