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This is a big issue between my husband and me. He says always put a comma after a name, I say only when a break is needed. Example:

A review of the complaint filed by Andrew, shows that Linnea, and John, did in fact violate state laws when they were covering up the crimes of officer Johns, and that Andrew, in fact, has a rightful claim against the Defendants.

F1Krazy
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A. McGowan
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2 Answers2

34

It's easy to find examples where a comma would be totally wrong: "Michael said John was drunk" means something completely different from "Michael, said John, was drunk".

Michael Kay
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28

Proper nouns are, for punctuation purposes, exactly like common nouns. Since, therefore, you would write:

A review of the complaint filed by the shopkeeper shows that the secretary and the clerk did in fact violate state laws when they were covering up the crimes of the officer, and that the shopkeeper, in fact, has a rightful claim against the Defendants.

you would write the same lack of commas with names.

Note that "officer Johns/the officer" has a comma after it because it ends an independent clause, and the second "Andrew/the shopkeeper" does because it is followed by a parenthetical phrase.

Mary
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