Commonwealth v. Whitney’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

6 federal appellate · 139 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 149 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “‘must determine whether the factual findings are supported by the record. When it is a defendant who has appealed, we must consider only the evidence of the prosecution and so much of the evidence for the defense as, fairly read in the context of the record as a whole, remains uncontradicted. Assuming that there is support in the record, we are bound by the facts as are found and we may reverse the suppression court only if the legal conclusions drawn from those facts are in error.’”

   8 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. D'Amato · 391 Pa. Super. 273 - Commonwealth v. Parsons

2. “[S]hortly before 4:00 A.M. on October 10, 1981, a man gained access to the second floor apartment of Juliana Minor through a window. The man, identified later that night by Ms. Minor as appellant, came into her bedroom where she lay in bed. Armed with a knife, he threatened to kill her if she wasn’t quiet. He asked if she recognized him; she responded that she didn’t. He then announced that he was in the “wrong” apartment. Nonetheless, he stole items from her jewelry box, cut her telephone wire, and soon thereafter left through a window onto a ledge. Moments later appellant entered the apartment of Jehad Taha and Mahin Murtaza, husband and wife, just two doors away from Ms. Minor’s apartment on the same floor. Realizing that someone was in the apartment, Mr. Taha got out of bed and went to the living room to investigate. Mrs. Murtaza heard someone hit her husband and she attempted to contact the police on the bedroom phone. Before she was able to get through she saw her husband at the bedroom door, blood running from his chest and face, with appellant standing behind him holding a knife to his neck. As Mrs. Murtaza hung up the phone appellant threw Mr. Taha to the bed and approached Mrs. Murtaza, holding his knife to her chest. Appellant demanded money and jewelry. She gave him jewelry from a candle case; appellant forcibly removed what jewelry the victims were wearing. He then announced his desire to rape Mrs. Murtaza and tore off her brassiere. Before carrying these intenti”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Commonwealth v. Whitney · Commonwealth v. Whitney

3. “`A trial court should award a new trial on the ground that the verdict is against the weight of the evidence only when the jury's verdict is so contrary to the evidence as to shock one's sense of justice and [make] the award of a new trial... imperative so that right may be given another opportunity to prevail.'”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 446 Pa. Super. 408 - Commonwealth v. Widmer · 403 Pa. Super. 342 - Commonwealth v. Purcell