Commonwealth v. Reeves’s Empirical Analysis
1972
Citation profile
43 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 43 later decisions — most recently August 1999 · most notably 230 Pa. Super. 563 - Commonwealth v. Kloch (1974), 229 Pa. Super. 363 - Commonwealth v. Quarles (1974)
43 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on North v. People · Roddy v. Finnegan · Pinkerton v. Verberg · 218 Pa. Super. 215 - Commonwealth v. Vassiljev · Rhodes v. McWilson
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 43 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““(a) Any person who operates a motor vehicle . . . in this Commonwealth, shall be deemed to have given his consent to a chemical test of his breath, for the purpose of determining the alcoholic content of his blood: Provided, That the test is administered by qualified personnel and with equipment approved by the secretary at the direction of a police officer having reasonable grounds to believe the person to have been driving while under the influence of intoxicating liquor. Qualified personnel means a physician or a police officer who has received training in the use of such equipment in a training program approved by the secretary. If any person is placed under arrest and charged with the operation of a motor vehicle . . . while under the influence of intoxicating liquor and is thereafter requested to submit to a chemical test and refuses to do so, the test shall not be given but the secretary may suspend his license or permit to operate a motor vehicle . . . with or without a hearing .... “(b) In any summary proceeding or criminal proceeding in which the defendant is charged with driving a motor vehicle . . . while under the influence of intoxicating liquor, the amount of alcohol in the defendant’s blood, as shown by a chemical analysis of his breath, his blood, or his urine, which analysis was conducted with, equipment approved by the secretary and operated by qualified personnel, shall be admissible in evidence.” According to the Commonwealth, “[t]he underlying rationale”
1 later decision quote this exact passage““This precept forbidding warrantless arrests for misdemeanors committed out of the presence of the arresting officer has roots in the Magna Carta which was promulgated in England in 1215 . . . The English Courts long ago ruled that a constable could not arrest for a breach of peace done out of his sight. Sharrock v. Hannemer, Cro. Eliz. pt. 1, p. 375, 78 Eng. Reprint 622 (1970). This principle has so long been common knowledge that in 1899 the Michigan Supreme Court enunciated this rule and said that the concept was so elementary that no authorities need be cited for the proposition.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.