State v. Aaron’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

19 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. “Testimony given at a properly held preliminary hearing satisfies the requirements of the confrontation clause of the Sixth Amendment when the witness is unavailable to testify at trial. While the scheduling of the preliminary hearing makes it preferable to have live testimony at trial rather than reading into the trial record the transcript of the testimony at the preliminary hearing for the very reason that discovery cannot be completed before such a hearing, the inability of defense counsel to conduct the same cross-examination early in the pretrial process as would be conducted at trial does not mean that the testimony lacks sufficient reliability to admit it for trial.”

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

2. “it is difficult to find that [the defendant] had 'the same interest and motive in his cross-examination' " since "the issue at the preliminary hearing was whether probable cause existed ... whereas the issue at trial was whether [the defendant] was guilty of the charged crimes beyond a reasonable doubt.”

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

3. “to determine if there is probable cause to believe that a felony has been committed and that the accused is the offender so that he may be bound over and formally charged and tried in the circuit court or discharged if probable cause is not found.”

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