276 Pa. Super. 282 - Commonwealth v. Barone’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

45 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 45 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““Any person who unintentionally causes the death of another person while engaged in the violation of any law of this Commonwealth or municipal ordinance applying to the operation or use of a vehicle or to the regulation of traffic is guilty of homicide by vehicle, a misdemeanor of the first degree, when the violation is the cause of death.””

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 341 Pa. Super. 183 - Commonwealth v. Heck · 278 Pa. Super. 490 - Commonwealth v. Wilkinson

2. “these weighty concerns are not jeopardized by reading the subject statute as not dispensing with the requirement that the harm causing violation must nevertheless be culpable. More directly, to credit the legislature with an intent to deter life endangering conduct on our roadways is to acknowledge that in order for punishment to be efficacious and just under this provision, it must be predicated upon the accused’s awareness of the factors which made his conduct criminal. Thus, conviction, punishment, and sentence may well provide inadvertent violators with an additional incentive to take more care in both evaluating the risks thsy consciously create and those which they unreasonably fail to perceive. In either case, however, the assumption which underlies the punishment is that the actor ignored the operative factors in creating a risk of harm to others. Confronted with imprisonment, the violator may indeed think twice prior to speeding through a densely populated neighborhood. On the other hand, to suggest as the [djissent does that our legislature intentionally chose to disregard the social utility of the driver’s conduct is to impute to the legislature a harshness and shortsightedness which we cannot. While there is always some risk associated with driving an auto, we do not think that the legislature in its collective wisdom intended to abrogate the possibility of a finding that the risk taken was reasonable under the particular circumstances.”

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

3. “if the ultimate goal is to protect the public from imprudent driver conduct, then what purpose is to be served by punishing an operator who may have acted reasonably and prudently under the circumstances!?] To demonstrate, failing to adhere to the left-right-left rule when merging into traffic involves more risk to others; however, in a civil action a jury of the defendant's peers may find that it was not unreasonable to omit to observe this rule when the defendant is rushing an injured person to a hospital. To hold, as the [d]issent does, that this same defendant may be criminally punished without reference to his state of mind simply does not make sense. If, with reference to the accused’s evaluation of and perception of the operative factors, his conduct conforms to what is socially acceptable under the same or similar circumstances, how does this mark him as one who needs to suffer punishment?”

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