State v. Harris’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

15 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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “(1) The defendant was previously convicted of one or more felonies, other than the present charge, the statutory elements of which involve the use of violence to the person; (2) the murder was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel in that it involved torture or serious physical abuse beyond that necessary to produce death; (3) the murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding, interfering with or preventing a lawful arrest or prosecution of the defendant or another; (4) the murder was knowingly committed, solicited, directed or aided by the defendant while the defendant had a substantial role in committing or attempting to commit a robbery; and (5) the victim of the murder was seventy years of age or older:”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. State v. Guy

2. “unless the error affirmatively appears to have affected the result of the trial on the merits, or considering the whole record, the error involves a substantial right which more probably than not affected the judgment or would result in prejudice to the judicial process.”

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

3. “trial court has both the power and the duty to redirect the jury's attention to the law and return them to the jury room with directions to reconsider their verdict.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. State v. McKinney