Commonwealth v. Lopez’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 federal appellate · 2 district · 7 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 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Paint smears taken from a screwdriver found in the defendant’s truck matched the paint on the automobile in which the body was found. Fibers consistent with those from the victim’s multicolored shorts were found in the defendant’s truck, and black fibers consistent with the truck’s carpet were found on the victim’s sandals. In addition, the defendant’s black pants contained stains of iron and rust, white paint chips, and red fibers consistent with those from the victim’s hooded shirt.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. López v. Massachusetts · Lopez v. Commonwealth of MA

2. “Merely introducing another possible suspect, without substantial admissible evidence that this person, and not the defendant, may have committed the crimes, does not warrant a new trial. Here, the possibility of Garcia as an alternate suspect was presented to some extent at trial, and rejected by the jury. The little additional and generalized information contained in the defendant’s postconviction affidavits casts no real doubt on the validity of the jury’s verdicts.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. López v. Massachusetts · Lopez v. Commonwealth of MA

3. “a substantial risk that, [if] the jury [were] exposed to [the Garcia-Kojak] evidence, [it] would have reached a different conclusion.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 349 F. Supp. 2d 109 - Lopez v. Massachusetts · Lpez v. Massachusetts