Commonwealth v. Werner’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

14 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 14 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““In order for an accused to intelligently evaluate his predicament, he should know what a lawyer representing him alone could do. He should know what a lawyer who represents another co-defendant may be hindered from doing. The court should tell the accused that if he cannot afford to hire another lawyer, then he will be represented by a court-appointed attorney. . . . “We are convinced that appellant could not intelligently evaluate whether to waive counsel. The colloquy does not indicate that he was aware of the considerations that underlay his choice. . . . “Apparently . . . appellant was concerned that he could not afford to employ counsel. He knew trial counsel and intended to ‘pay him in the future.’ It may indeed have been the case that appellant was reluctant to attempt to search anew for counsel. The court did not inform him that should he wish to change counsel and should he be unable to hire another, he would have counsel appointed to represent him. “. . . The colloquy of the court is insufficient to establish a competent and intelligent waiver. Since we cannot tell what choice appellant would have made had he been informed and since a potential of harm existed from the dual representation, we conclude that error was committed below.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Miller

2. “When two or more defendants are represented by a single counsel, the District Court has a duty to ascertain whether each defendant has an awareness of the potential risks of that course and nevertheless has knowingly chosen it.. . . The judge's responsibility is not necessarily discharged by simply accepting the co-defendants' designation of a single attorney to represent them both. An individual defendant is rarely sophisticated enough to evaluate the potential conflicts, and when two defendants appear with a single attorney, it cannot be determined, absent inquiry by the trial judge, whether the attorney has made such an appraisal or has advised his clients of the risks.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 262 Pa. Super. 189 - Commonwealth v. Bracero

3. “In order for an accused to intelligently evaluate his predicament, he should know what a lawyer representing him alone could do. He should know what a lawyer who represents another co-defendant may be hindered from doing. The court should tell the accused that if he cannot afford to hire another lawyer, then he will be represented by a court-appointed attorney. Certainly, whatever the risks and disabilities inhere in joint representation inhere whether counsel is appointed or retained; and whatever steps a defendant is entitled to take to avoid such problems should be make known to him whatever his economic situation may be.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Heaney