Commonwealth v. Rodriguez’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 2 district · 23 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 30 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[a] police stop of a moving automobile constitutes a seizure,”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Sanborn · Commonwealth v. Buckley

2. “agree that 'the odor of marijuana is sufficiently distinctive that it alone can supply probable cause to believe that marijuana is nearby.' " Guzman , 2008 VT 116 , ¶ 13, 184 Vt. 518 , 965 A.2d 544 (quoting Commonwealth v. Garden , 451 Mass. 43 , 883 N.E.2d 905 , 910 (2008) ). But see Commonwealth v. Rodriguez , 472 Mass. 767 , 37 N.E.3d 611 , 618 (2015) (" Garden 's conclusion that the odor of marijuana alone creates probable cause to believe that the drug is still present is insufficiently nuanced, because it fails to account for the significant possibility that the odor of burnt marijuana may be present on a person or in a vehicle, but the drug itself is not.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Gregory W. Zullo v. State of Vermont

3. “[W]here the only factor leading an officer to conclude that an individual possesses marijuana is the smell of burnt marijuana, this factor supports a reasonable suspicion that the individual is committing the civil offense of possession of a small quantity of marijuana, but not probably cause to believe that he or she is committing the offense.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Walker v. Femino