768 So. 2d 728 - State v. Williams’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

15 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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Only under a theory that the prosecution was under an affirmative duty to rule out every hypothesis except that of guilty beyond a reasonable doubt could this petitioner’s challenge be sustained. That theory the court has rejected in the past. (Cite omitted). We decline to adopt it today. Under the standard established in this opinion as necessary to preserve the due process protection recognized in [In re] Winship[ 397 U.S. 358 , 90 S.Ct. 1068 , 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970)], a federal habeas corpus court faced with a record of historical facts that support conflicting inferences, must presume — even if it does not appear in the record — that the trier of fact resolved any such conflicts in favor of the prosecution, and must defer to that resolution. Applying these criteria, we hold that a rational trier of fact could have found that the petitioner committed murder in the first degree under Virginia law. (Emphasis added).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 17 So. 3d 1053 - State v. SARRETT