Clark 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 instructs the Jury that a person may not use more force that reasonably appears necessary to save his life or protect himself from great bodily harm. The question of whether he was justified in using the weapon is for the determination by the Jury. The law tolerates no justification and accepts no excuse for an assault with a deadly weapon on the pleas of self defense except that the assault by the defendant on the victim was necessary or apparently so to protect the defendant’s own life or his person from great bodily injury and there was immediate danger of such design being accomplished. The danger to life or of great personal injury must be, or being accomplished. The danger to life or of great personal injury must be, or reasonably appears to be, imminent and present at the time the defendant commits the assault with the deadly weapon. The term “apparent” as used in “apparent danger” means such overt, actual demonstration by conduct and acts of a design to take life or do some great personal injury as would make the assault apparently necessary to self-preservation or to escape great bodily harm.”

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