Heatherly v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 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 3 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “We do not purport to get into the logistics of Heatherly’s earlier indictments and convictions; however, we note that the sentences that he received in both of those instances were based on statutory guidelines as well. The charge that we are looking to here, the sale of less than one ounce of marijuana, is a separate and distinct charge from those previous indictments. There is no evidence in the record and nothing presented by Heath-erly which would indicate to this Court that the instant charge was intended to be a “package deal” so to speak. In other words, we find nothing that would prove that the State offered a plea bargain or any other deal that would give Heatherly only one all-inclusive sentence for all of his controlled substance convictions. In actuality, the fact that Heath-erly is already serving separate sentences for different previous controlled substance convictions indicates to this Court that the State did not intend for the sentence in the instant charge to be merged into his existing sentences which he is now serving, hence the reason the State pursued this charge separately. We find, and Heatherly provides, no association between the charge at issue here and the previous crimes for which Heatherly is already being punished. As such, according to the statute, the sentence received by Heath-erly for the sale of less than one ounce of marijuana is within the law and is far from being grossly disproportionate to the crime. It is also interesting to note tha”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Heatherly v. State