State v. LaPIETRA’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

20 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 20 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “the argument that [the defendants make is essentially advocating how to characterize the pretrial transcripts of witness interviews that were given to the district court. . . . [The defendants’ argument, while stipulating to what is known at the pretrial juncture, amounts to a disagreement with the [sjtate as to what a reasonable jury could conclude. The evidence contained in the transcripts can be viewed in a variety of ways, one of which would allow a jury to conclude that either [the djefendant or both [the djefendants committed the abuse, allowed the abuse to happen, or knew, or should have known, that the abuse was occurring. . . . While the district court may have thought the [sjtate had a weak case, the district court did not have the opportunity to observe testimony of witnesses under oath, judge their credibility, weigh the evidence, and hear opposing arguments after the close of evidence.”

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

2. “The contours of the district court's power to conduct a pretrial hearing on a motion to dismiss charges ... is a legal question reviewed under a de novo standard.”

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

3. “In Foulenfont , we stated that it was proper for a district court to decide purely legal matters and dismiss a case when appropriate before trial[,]”

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