Commonwealth v. Spetzer’s Empirical Analysis
2002
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 27 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 29 later decisions — most recently August 2024 · most notably Commonwealth v. Small (2009), Commonwealth v. Mattison (2013)
2 federal appellate · 27 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 Strickland v. Washington · United States v. Nixon · Elkins v. United States · Trammel v. United States · Ashcroft Attorney General v. Free Speech Coalition
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 29 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“§ 5913. Spouses as witnesses against each other Except as otherwise provided in this subchapter, in a criminal proceeding a person shall have the privilege, which he or she may waive, not to testify against his or her then lawful spouse except that there shall be no such privilege: (1) in proceedings for desertion or maintenance; (2) in any criminal proceeding against either for bodily injury or violence attempted, done or threatened upon the other, or upon the minor children of said husband and wife, or the minor children of either of them, or any minor child in their care or custody, or in the care or custody of either of them; (3) applicable to proof of the fact of marriage, in support of a criminal charge of bigamy alleged to have been committed by or with the other; or (4) in any criminal proceeding in which one of the charges pending against the defendant includes murder, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse or rape.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent“(a) General rule. — In addition to the rules of evidence provided under 42 Pa. C.S. Ch. 63 (relating to juvenile matters), the rules of evidence in this section shall govern in child abuse proceedings in court or in any department administrative hearing pursuant to section 6341 (relating to amendment or expunction of information).[ 6 1 [[Image here]] (c) Privileged communications. — Except for privileged communications between a lawyer and a client and between a minister and a penitent, a privilege of confidential communication between husband and wife or between any professional person, including, but not limited to, physicians, psychologists, counselors, employees of hospitals, clinics, day-care centers and schools and their patients or clients, shall not constitute grounds for excluding evidence at any proceeding regarding child abuse or the cause of child abuse.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent“Even if it is assumed that the [statutory-exceptions to the marital communications privilege specifically addressing child abuse do] not act directly to provide a broad child abuse “exception” to [the application of Pennsylvania’s marital communications privilege] in criminal proceedings, it certainly affects what a spouse’s “reasonable expectation” of continued confidentiality may be with respect to marital communications that reveal the previous or intended abuse and intimidation of a child.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent
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.