Commonwealth v. Baseler’s Empirical Analysis
1995
Citation profile
28 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 30 later decisions — most recently April 2019 · most notably Commonwealth v. Pike (1998), Commonwealth v. Walker (2005)
28 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on National Farmers Union Insurance v. Crow Tribe of Indians · Commonwealth v. Harrington · United States v. Silvern · United States v. Hewes · United States v. Holman
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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The trial judge properly gave an instruction on deadly force when he charged the jury on the law of self-defense regarding assault and battery by means of a dangerous weapon. Nevertheless, the judge used the same deadly force instruction that he had given for assault and battery by means of a dangerous weapon when he charged the jury on the law of self-defense for simple assault and battery. Thus, the judge charged the jury on deadly force when he should have given an instruction on self-defense relating to nondeadly force. See Commonwealth v. Bastarache , [ 382 Mass. 86 , 105, 414 N.E.2d 984 (1980) ]. As a result, the judge's instruction lowered the Commonwealth's burden of proving that the defendant did not act in self-defense in relation to the assault and battery charge. Instead of having to prove that the defendant did not have a reasonable concern over his own safety, see ibr.US_Case_Law.Schema.Case_Body:v1”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“right reasonably to use a nondeadly force, such as one's fists, in self-defense, arises at a somewhat lower level of danger ... than the right to use a dangerous weapon”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“a reasonable concern over his personal safety.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.