84 Ark. App. 362 - Whittier v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

6 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 6 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Rainey, who was approximately 25, and Kirkpatrick, a middle-aged woman, had known each other for several years and had engaged in sexual intercourse on at least three occasions. On March 6, 1991, at approximately 7:00 p.m., Rainey went to visit Kirkpatrick at her house, carrying a loaded semi-automatic pistol. Rainey testified he carried the gun for protection. Testimony revealed that both Rainey and Kirkpatrick had been drinking that day, and Rainey had been smoking marijuana. Kirkpatrick let Rainey into her house through the side door, and he placed the pistol on the kitchen bar. They engaged in sexual intercourse in the bedroom. Afterward, according to Rainey’s testimony, they had a heated argument. Kirkpatrick told Rainey she was going to tell his wife about their affair and “ruin his family.” She then got dressed and walked into the front room. Rainey 1 (¡presumed Kirkpatrick was getting a beer from the kitchen. The argument continued while Rainey was dressing in the bedroom. Rainey called Kirkpatrick an “old whore” and told her he was not going to see her anymore. Upon walking into the front room, Rai-ney testified he saw Kirkpatrick pointing the pistol at him. He grabbed her hand, pointed the gun toward the ceiling, and a shot fired. Police later recovered a bullet from the ceiling. Rainey then took the gun away from Kirkpatrick and shot her four times in the head as she was falling to the floor. He testified that after the first shot he was so hysterical that he kept ”

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

2. “The jury was presented with evidence that Rainey shot Kirkpatrick while in a fit of anger aroused by being threatened with a gun. The jury could have believed that this anger provoked an extreme emotional disturbance for which there was a reasonable excuse, and thus it could have found Rainey guilty of manslaughter rather than murder in the first degree.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 2009 Ark. App. 627 - Taylor v. State