Wilson v. Beard’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

17 federal appellate · 37 district · 6 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 79 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “In 1997, Jack McMahon, the Assistant District Attorney who prosecuted Wilson's first case, won the Republican nomination to challenge incumbent District Attorney Lynne Abraham. On March 31, 1997, eleven days after the primary election, Abraham released a videotape from the late 1980s which showed McMahon giving a training session on jury selection to other prosecutors in the District Attorney’s Office. In the tape, McMahon makes a number of highly inflammatory comments implying that he regularly seeks to keep qualified African-Americans from serving on juries. Since these comments are central to [Wilson's] appeal, we will quote from them at length. McMahon began his presentation by reviewing the procedures followed by Pennsylvania courts in selecting juries. He then proceeded to discuss his views of the goals a prosecutor should have in mind in selecting a jury: The case law says that the object of getting a jury is to get — I wrote it down. I looked in the cases. I had to look this up because I didn't know this was the purpose of a jury. "Voir dire is to get a competent, fair, and impartial jury.” Well, that's ridiculous. You’re not trying to get that. You're — both sides are trying to get the jury most likely to do whatever they want them to do. And if you go in there and any one of you think you’re going to be some noble civil libertarian and try to get jurors, "Well, he says he can be fair; I’ll go with him," that’s ridiculous. You'll lose and you'll be out of the office;”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Abu-Jamal v. Horn · 2016 Pa. Super. 124 - Commonwealth v. Roane

2. “[Gjiven that federal courts must add some additional period of days to the limitations period to account for the time it takes for a letter to be received, we think it eminently sensible to apply Rule 6(e). Cf. Seitzinger, 165 F.3d at 239 . We therefore conclude that, in the absence of proof of the actual date of receipt, three days should be added to the habeas limitations period for Wilson’s petition. Since the Commonwealth concedes that ‘it could not be said with absolute certainty when Mr. Wilson received the Commonwealth’s April 3, 1997 letter,’ it was not error for the District Court to apply Rule 6(e).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. DeFrancesco v. Weir Hazelton, Inc.

3. ““First, the defendant must make out a prima facie case ‘by showing that the totality of the relevant facts gives rise to an inference of discriminatory purpose.’ Second, once the defendant has made out a prima facie case, the ‘burden shifts to the State to explain adequately the racial exclusion’ by offering permissible race-neutral justifications for the strikes. Third, ‘if a race-neutral explanation is tendered, the trial court must then decide ... whether the opponent of the strike has proved purposeful racial discrimination.’ ””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 178 F. App'x 152 - United States v. Rodriguez