Commonwealth v. Barnett’s Empirical Analysis
1979
Citation profile
39 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 39 later decisions — most recently November 2025 · most notably In the Interest of O.A. (1998), Commonwealth v. Matos (1996)
39 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 Terry v. Ohio · Commonwealth v. Bosurgi · Commonwealth v. Jeffries · Commonwealth v. Wrona · Commonwealth v. Berrios
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 39 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Under these circumstances, the suppression court was correct in finding that the officers did more than merely approach appellee for questioning. The police conduct here amounted to a coercive factor which was the main reason that appellee abandoned the weapon.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“a policeman may legally stop a person and question him. But he may not without a warrant restrain that person from walking away ..., unless he has ‘probable cause to arrest that person or he observes such unusual and suspicious conduct on the part of the person who is stopped ... that the policeman may reasonably conclude that criminal activity was afoot____’ We must thus view the totality of the circumstances to determine whether appellee was being ‘stopped’ or was merely approached for allowable questioning by the officers.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“... If a citizen approached by a police officer is ordered to stop or is physically restrained, obviously a ‘stop’ occurs. Equally obvious is a situation where a police officer approaches a citizen and addresses questions to him, the citizen attempts to leave, and the officer orders him to remain or physically restrains him; here too a ‘stop’ occurs. A more difficult situation arises where no order or physical restraint is involved and the citizen does not attempt to walk away.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.