185 Md. App. 293 - Miller v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 district · 8 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 10 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Consistent with the requirements of due process, the decisions of this Court have always required that a guilty plea, to be valid, must be entered voluntarily and intelligently. The fundamental rule outlined in our cases is that a plea of guilty may be entered under circumstances showing a voluntary desire on the part of the accused to do so, with an intelligent understanding of the nature of the offense to which he is pleading guilty and the possible consequences of such a plea. It was the law of this State, prior to the adoption of Rule 731 c, that no specific ritual was required to be followed by the trial judge in order to satisfy himself of the voluntary character of the plea and of the fact that the defendant understands the nature and effect of a plea of guilty. [We have said] ... that it [i]s the duty of the trial judge to ascertain that the guilty-pleading defendant is aware of the nature of the charges and the consequences of a guilty plea. In discharging this duty, the trial judge is not required ... ritualistically and personally [to] advise the accused of these matters, it being sufficient if the defendant is made aware of the consequences of his guilty plea regardless of the source whence the information comes.”

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

2. “allowing a trial court, in ensuring that a guilty plea is knowing, voluntary, and entered intelligently, to rely essentially on nothing more than a presumption that “in most cases defense counsel routinely explain the nature of the offense in sufficient detail to give the accused notice of ... what he is being asked to admit” runs contrary to Rule 4-242’s requirement that there be an adequate examination “on the record in open court.””

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

3. “[A] reviewing court may be able to determine that a defendant gained ... an adequate understanding of the offense and notice of the nature of the charge [from] ... allegations in the indictment, ... the prosecution’s summation at the plea submission hearing ... or [if] the relevant element of the offense is a self-explanatory legal term, so simple in meaning that a layperson can be expected to understand it.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 754 F. Supp. 2d 774 - Castellon-Gutierrez v. United States