Commonwealth v. Herron’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

53 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 53 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “. . . more is necessary than a mere assertion by the defendant that such disclosure might be helpful in establishing a particular defense. . . . Although the defendant plainly cannot be expected to show that such information will actually be helpful to his defense, the record should at least suggest a reasonable possibility that the information might be helpful, so that it would be unfair to withhold it.”

   9 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Koonce · Commonwealth v. Ellison

2. ““I believe [informant] might offer evidence that the entire plan and format as to how this entire purchase was to be set up was made between the informant and this Police Officer in advance; that the conversations between [defendant] and [informant] may have been much more by predesign; that [informant] may have well been told by this Officer that he was to tell [defendant] certain things to induce the sale, that is, as to where he worked, who he was, who he knew, that sort of thing.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 444 Pa. Super. 264 - Commonwealth v. Hritz