Commonwealth v. Kravitz’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

5 federal appellate · 215 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 228 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “. .In nearly every criminal and civil case, one side or the other would like to have some or all of the witnesses of his opponent sequestered. The lack of adequate room space, the long delays which would inevitably be caused by sequestration and other practical considerations, make sequestration of witnesses ordinarily impractical or inadvisable, except in unusual circumstances.* For the foregoing reasons the question of sequestration of witnesses is left largely to the discretion of the trial judge and his decision thereon will be reversed only for a clear abuse of discretion. “ * A request for sequestration of a witness or witnesses should be specific and should be supported by some reason or reasons demonstrating that the interests of Justice require it. “In Commonwealth v. Turner, 371 Pa. 417, 429 , 88 A.2d 915 , the Court said: ‘In Pennsylvania it has long been established that the trial judge has the power to permit sequestration of witnesses: Commonwealth v. Principatti, 260 Pa. 587 , 104 A. 53 ; and that it is a matter within the discretion of the trial judge: Commonwealth v. Sloat, 298 Pa. 10 , 147 A. 834 .’ ””

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Zeid · Commonwealth v. Henry

2. “need not be absolutely incompatible with [the] defendant's innocence, but the question of any doubt is for the jury unless the evidence `be so weak and inconclusive that as a matter of law no probability of fact can be drawn from the combined circumstances.'”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 423 Pa. Super. 32 - Commonwealth v. Loeper · 446 Pa. Super. 408 - Commonwealth v. Widmer

3. ““If eyewitness testimony of the commission of a murder were necessary, or if the Commonwealth had to exclude the possibility of a third person committing the crime — which would, in reality, require an eyewitness or the capture of defendant “red-handed” — few murderers would ever be convicted, and society could not possibly be adequately protected. Moreover, even if a defendant was caught running away from the murder scene right after the murder, he would have to be acquitted under the “exclusion” theory because he could contend that he was running away in order to avoid suspicion or to escape from the unknown criminal’s at tempt to murder him. In the Sauders case, in the Bolish case, in the Homeyer case, in the Wentzel case, [Com. v. Wentzel, 360 Pa. 137 , 61 A.2d 309 ], in the Danz case, [Com. v. Danz, 211 Pa. 507 , 60 A. 1070 ], in the Boden case, [Com. v. Boden, 399 Pa. 298 , 159 A.2d 894 ], in the Carey case, [Com. v. Carey, 368 Pa. 157 , 82 A.2d 240 ], and in Commonwealth v. LaRue, 381 Pa. 113 , 112 A.2d 362 , infra (to mention just a few) there were no eyewitnesses to the murder; the exact time of death was unknown; and any third party or unknown person could have committed the murder. Any refinements or distortion of the law such as defendant urges would not only require us to overrule a myriad decisions of this Court, but would make the protection of society in most cases realistically impossible.” Commonwealth v. Kravitz, 400 Pa. 198, 212-13 , 161 A.2d 861, 868 (196”

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