316 Pa. Super. 397 - Commonwealth v. Stanton’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

14 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 14 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “In our evaluation of appellant’s contention, we note that “[t]his Court has consistently held that, in reviewing jury instructions for prejudicial and reviewable error, the charge must be read and considered as a whole ... Error cannot be predicated on isolated excerpts of the charge. It is the general effect of the charge that controls.” Commonwealth v. Woodward, 483 Pa. 1, 4 , 394 A.2d 508 (1978) (citations omitted). In reviewing the whole charge, we first conclude that the court’s instruction in the second paragraph quoted above simply served to distinguish for the jury the difference between first and second degree murder. The only presumption a reasonable juror could have interpreted the instruction as creating was that once murder was found, it was presumptively only second degree murder absent additional proof by the Commonwealth. Such a presumption certainly was not harmful to appellant, but was, if anything beneficial to him under the 1939 Penal Code.[*] As to the first paragraph quoted above, we find that the effect of the whole charge was to create merely a permissive presumption of malice.[**] For example, the trial court specifically stated the following in its charge: Now, the use of a weapon such as a firearm, against a vital part of a person’s body, such as the head or chest, is a fact from which you may infer the existence of malice.[***] A permissive presumption is constitutionally valid if it can “be said with substantial assurance that the presumed fact is”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 354 Pa. Super. 32 - Commonwealth v. Hill

2. “Now, if you find that this killing by the defendant resulted from a voluntary act without justification or excuse, the presumption is that the killing is malicious. Therefore, being presumed to be malicious, the killing would be presumed to be murder. All unlawful malicious killings are murder, but it is only where the elements of first degree murder have been proved to your satisfaction that a conviction for that degree could be had.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 354 Pa. Super. 32 - Commonwealth v. Hill

3. “In all unlawful killings without justification or excuse, where the act of slaying was voluntary, the presumption is that it is murder of the second degree only and the burden is upon the Commonwealth to prove that it is first degree murder.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 354 Pa. Super. 32 - Commonwealth v. Hill