Commonwealth v. Quaranta’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

7 federal appellate · 103 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 119 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““But every offense or crime under the law is not relevant to prove one’s character for veracity, and, as it is not permissible to show a general bad character because of the abuse that could be made of it by the prosecution . . . the only crimes admissible to attack veracity are such as affect credibility and refer to the conviction of a felony or misdemeanor in the nature of crimen falsi”.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Lyons v. Gantz

2. ““We hold, in accordance with the preponderant view, that, whenever one who has been pardoned of a crime such as would ordinarily affect credibility, testifies as a defendant in a criminal case, the judgment of conviction may be inquired into, and the issuance of the pardon may also be shown.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Tansimore

3. ““A full pardon releases the punishment and blots out the existence of guilt, so that, in the eyes of the law, the offender is as innocent as if he had never committed the offense.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Tansimore