Commonwealth v. Ortiz’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

15 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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “A prosecutor is 'permitted and expected to marshal the evidence and to argue for a decision of the controversy in favor of his client.' Commonwealth v. Johnson , 374 Mass. 453 , 459 [ 373 N.E.2d 1121 ] (1978). The prosecutor suggested that the jury make a permissible inference that was based in the evidence. See ... Kater , 432 Mass. [at] 422 [ 734 N.E.2d 1164 ].”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 94 Mass. App. Ct. 613 - Commonwealth v. Casbohm

2. “the prosecutor was responding to an argument made by defense counsel,”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 94 Mass. App. Ct. 815 - Commonwealth v. Bannister