DeCiantis v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 federal appellate · 1 district · 23 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 25 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “when we are called upon to conduct such a de novo review with respect to issues of constitutional dimension, we still accord great deference to a hearing justice's findings of historical fact and to inferences drawn from those facts.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Tracey Barros v. State of Rhode Island · Kendall Whitaker v. State of Rhode Island

2. “The state’s witness Louis Schiappa testified that on December 4, 1981, he observed two other men force the victim into a car driven by Anthony DeCiantis. The witness stated that he had seen DeCiantis drive the car on prior occasions, and he identified the first two letters on the license plate. These two letters were identical to those on the registration of a car owned by defendant’s sister. The next day Dennis Roche’s body was discovered in a dump in Providence. According to Deputy Medical Examiner Arthur Burns, Roche had died from a gunshot wound to the “trunk.” Roche had suffered a second gunshot wound, several stab wounds, and injuries to the face and head consistent with his having been run over by a car. The state offered three additional witnesses, each of whom testified about separate occasions on which defendant had admitted to killing Roche. Louis Campagnone testified that approximately two months after Roche’s murder, he and defendant were in a restaurant when DeCiantis admitted to having killed Roche, claiming that he did it because he believed Roche to have been responsible for the disappearance of De-Ciantis’ brother, Rocco. Robert Livingston testified that during the summer of 1982, he and defendant had a conversation in which “Anthony DeCiantis told me that he and Ricky Silva had killed Dennis Roche.... He said that Ricky had shot him and he had stabbed him.” Livingston also testified that Rocco DeCiantis’s disappearance had motivated the killing.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. DeCiantis v. Wall

3. “Q: And is it your claim, sir, that you have been promised nothing by way of consideration ... by way of sentence for [your] testimony? A: Like I said, there hasn’t been no final commitment given to me. I don’t really know what’s going to happen at this point. Q: You expect ... A: I am sure that I will be given protection somehow. They will have to do that unless I’ll be dead. Q: You expect more than protection for yourself and your family, do you know, Mr. Ferie? A: I’d like for that to happen. Q: You [would] very much like for that to happen, wouldn’t you? A: I think anybody would. Q: Isn’t it a fact that you are going to get it, sir? A: I can’t say that truthfully, I don’t know that. Q: You’re telling us, then, that you don’t care if you go to prison or on [sic] for all these crimes or not? A: I am not saying that. Q: Do you ... you do care, don’t you sir? A: Everybody cares, but whatever has to happen is going to happen. I can’t change that. I hope it doesn’t happen, but I don’t know what’s going to happen. All I am here is to tell the truth.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. DeCiantis v. Wall