Commonwealth v. Benoit’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

24 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 24 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Peremptory challenges are presumed to be proper, but that presumption may be rebutted on a showing that (1) there is a pattern of excluding members of a discrete grouping and (2) it is likely that individuals are being excluded solely on the basis of their membership in that group.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Ortega · Commonwealth v. Sudler

2. “right of self-defence does not accrue to a person 'until he has availed himself of all proper means in his power to decline the combat' "). On the merits of his self-defense claim, the defendant fares no better. "[T]he privilege to use self-defense arises only in circumstances in which the defendant uses all proper means to avoid physical combat.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 94 Mass. App. Ct. 581 - Commonwealth v. Leoner-Aguirre

3. “[W]hile appellate courts may be equipped to some extent to assess the adequacy of an explanation, they are particularly ill-equipped to assess its genuineness”

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