Commonwealth v. Wood’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 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 3 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[In Mattox , the Supreme Court] held that a matter “resting in the personal consciousness of one juror” may not be used to upset a jury’s verdict “because, being personal, it is not accessible to other testimony.” [Mattox, 146 U.S.] at 148, 13 S.Ct. 50 , 36 L.Ed. 917 . The Court stated that it would not give the “secret thoughts] of one [juror] the power to disturb the expressed conclusions of twelve.” Id. In sharp contrast to the secret thoughts of jurors, the Court held that juror testimony as to “overt acts” of misconduct can be considered because the remaining members of the jury can testify as to whether or not those acts of misconduct actually occurred. Id. at 148-49 , 13 S.Ct. 50 . The Court recognized that, by drawing this distinction, verifiable evidence of a jury’s consideration of extraneous prejudicial information could be considered by courts while still respecting the finality of jury verdicts by disallowing testimony as to the unverifiable thoughts of jurors. See id. at 148-49 , 13 S.Ct. 50 . Thus, the Supreme Court in Mattox held that, when addressing a motion for a new trial, courts should consider juror testimony concerning any overt acts of misconduct by which extraneous and potentially prejudicial information is presented to the jury, including juror testimony showing that a newspaper article relevant to the case was read aloud in the jury room.”

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