Giesberg v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 48 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 50 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “When the new Penal Code was adopted, the Legislature chose not to designate alibi as a statutory defense. In the Texas Penal Code, alibi is not enumerated either as a defense or as an affirmative defense. In the revised Penal Code, the statutory defense distinction is reserved for defensive theories involving a defendant’s admission that he or she committed the crime, but with explanations to justify a defendant’s actions or absolve a defendant of culpability. It also includes defensive theories which do not involve admission of complicity in the commission of the alleged crime, but which nonetheless attempt to explain why a defendant is not criminally culpable. ... If a defendant wishes to rely upon alibi as his defense, he bears the duty of going forward with evidence raising an alibi in order to create a reasonable doubt of the defendant’s presence at the time and place where the prime was committed. If the defendant’s actual presence at the time and place where the crime was committed is an essential part of the prosecution’s case, the State must prove the defendant’s actual presence at the scene of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. From this, it can be seen that an alibi can only create a doubt about whether the State has met its burden of proving that a defendant committed the offense where the defendant’s actual presence at the time and place of the commission of the offense is an issue in the State’s case.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Chris Haliburton v. State

2. “You have heard from the evidence that a person other than [the] defendant committed the offense for which the defendant is charged. The defendant is not required to prove the other person’s guilt. It is the prosecution that has the burden of proving the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt; therefore, the defendant is entitled to an acquittal. If you have a reasonable doubt as to the defendant’s guilt, evidence that another person committed the charged offense may by itself leave you with a reasonable doubt. If after considering all the evidence, including any evidence that another person committed the offense, you have a reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the offense, you must find the defendant not guilty.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Edward George McGregor v. State

3. “A defensive issue which goes no further than to merely negate an element of the offense alleged by the State in its indictment does not place a burden of proof upon a defendant to establish it. The burden of proof is upon the State to prove those allegations. An alibi only traverses those allegations and casts doubt upon whether the State has met its burden. As a result, an alibi is sufficiently embraced in a general charge to the jury that the defendant is presumed innocent until he or she is proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. There is ample room within that instruction for a defendant to effectively argue his defense of alibi to a jury.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Darrell Eugene Hutcherson v. State