Little v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 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 2 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The Court: [Neely] appears to be a regular missing person. Nobody seems to know where he is. I think we’ve probably waited long enough for him. It’s now ten minutes past 1:00 o’clock. He was due here at 10:30. Even if he couldn’t get to the courthouse, he could certainly get to a telephone. It looks to me like I don’t see any alternative but to declare a mistrial as far as this partieu- lar trial is concerned. Does anyone have any ideas about that? The State: The State is not opposed to a mistrial provided we can start up with a fresh panel tomorrow morning. Appellant: We’d be happy to sit here and wait and see if he shows up. The Court: That’s what we’ve been doing. I would think that three hours is sufficient time for a fellow to show up. It looks to me like he’s not going to be here. Appellant: In the interest of justice I think we should make a record that the weather has been horrible all day today, that there’s been a tremendous amount of flooding. It may well be that he is simply flooded and on his way. Since he’s hitchhiking or some other mode of transportation, it may take more than one vehicle to get here. [The Prosecutor] has already taken the time to call his friends and so on. The Court: We have eleven other jurors that have come from all parts of the county. I know that ... [Appellant’s counsel] ... has come all the way from Houston today. And everyone else was able to make it other than this one person coming from Friendswood. Even if he couldn’t make it to the”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Ex Parte Little

2. “The appellant argues that the trial court failed to consider the alternatives of issuing a writ of attachment for the missing juror, or proceeding to trial with eleven jurors. Under these facts, it was reasonable for the trial court to believe that a writ of attachment would be futile. Furthermore, the trial court reasonably believed that the appellant was not willing to proceed to trial with eleven jurors. When asked for alternatives to a mistrial, the appellant stated only that he was willing to wait for the missing juror. The trial court and eleven jurors had already waited three hours.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Ex Parte Little