Commonwealth v. Colon’s Empirical Analysis
1975
Citation profile
78 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 78 later decisions — most recently January 2021 · most notably Commonwealth v. Anderson (1983), Commonwealth v. Rodgers (1977)
78 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 Chambers v. Mississippi · United States v. Mitchell · Commonwealth v. Dancer · People v. Brown · Commonwealth v. Hackett
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 78 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The Court recently addressed the issue of the admissibility of declarations against penal interest in Commonwealth v. Nash, 457 Pa. 296 , 324 A.2d 344 (1974). Although the Court unanimously agreed that such declarations should be admissible in some circumstances, there was no majority view as to the rationale for or the conditions of admissibility. A plurality of the Court (Mr. Chief Justice Jones, Mr. Justice Pomeroy, and this writer) in a concurring opinion, id., 457 Pa. at 303 , 324 A.2d at 347 , concluded that there was no logical ground upon which declarations against penal interest could be distinguished from declarations against pecuniary and proprietary interest. The plurality recognized that declarations against interest are admissible as an exception to the hearsay rule because their trustworthiness is safeguarded by the improbability that a declarant would fabricate a statement which is contrary to his own interests. It resolved that this rationale was equally applicable whether the interest involved was pecuniary, proprietary, or penal.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“We conclude that the fact stated in that portion of Hernandez’s confession which exculpated any possible accomplices was not against interest and hence that portion was inadmissible. By telling the police that he acted alone, Hernandez admitted no additional crime, subjected himself to no additional punishment. Since it was not contrary to Hernandez’s interest to assert he acted alone, the portion of the statement in which he claimed to have acted alone does not have the safeguards of trustworthiness attributed to a statement truly against interest. On this basis, the trial court’s decision was correct as to this part of the statement. 461 Pa. at 584 , 337 A.2d at 558 .”
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.