Smith v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

12 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 12 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “In assessing the sufficiency of the evidence in a case modifying custody, the court of appeals will examine the evidence and its inferences in the light most favorable to the trial court's order, and defer to the trial court's assessment of the witnesses' credibility and accept the trial court's resolution of conflicting evidence, and presume that the trial court reviewed all of the evidence and based its decision on the child's best interest.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Melton v. Collins

2. “A residential change of the custodial parent to a distant location away from the non-custodial parent does not, by itself, establish that modification of the prior decree is appropriate.”

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