State v. Wommack’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

69 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 70 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[I]t is well settled that when the minutes and the transcript conflict, the transcript prevails.”

   10 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Romero · State v. Broussard

2. “[Louisiana Constitution Article 1], 20 guarantees that, “[n]o law shall subject any person to cruel or unusual punishment.” To constitute an excessive sentence, the reviewing court must find the penalty so grossly disproportionate to the severity of the crime as to shock our sense of justice or that the sentence makes no measurable contribution to acceptable penal goals and is, therefore, nothing more than a needless imposition of pain and suffering. The trial court has wide discretion in the imposition of sentence within the statutory limits and such sentence shall not be set aside as excessive absent a manifest abuse of discretion. The relevant question is whether the |strial court abused its broad sentencing discretion, not whether another sentence might have been more appropriate.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 150 So. 3d 547 - State v. Balach · 175 So. 3d 1164 - State v. Daugherty

3. “[T]he sentence of the Court is you are to serve life imprisonment, at hard labor, with Louisiana Department of Corrections. That sentence is without benefit of probation, parole or suspension of sentence. On the aggravated batteries of the police officers, you are to serve ten years on each of those sentences. Those sentences are to be concurrent with each other. I’m sorry. They’re to be consecutive with each other. That’s Count 2 and 3. Count 2 is 10; Count 3 is 10. They’re consecutive with each other and consecutive with Count 1, which is the life imprisonment. So that’s 120 years.[ 1 ]”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 74 So. 3d 774 - State v. DEVILLE · 157 So. 3d 21 - State v. Chehardy