Kennedy v. Maggio’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

14 federal appellate · 9 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 33 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “a plea entered in reliance on the defendant's attorney's patently erroneous statement of the law in relation to the facts”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 539 So. 2d 1378 - Leatherwood v. State · Czere, III v. Butler

2. “Our determination that ... counsel was ineffective mandates the conclusion that his plea of guilty was not “voluntary” in the constitutional sense. A plea of guilty [like a plea of nolo contendere] must be knowing and intelligent to pass constitutional muster [Brady v. United States, 397 U.S. 742 , 90 S.Ct. 1463 , 25 L.Ed.2d 747 (1970); Boykin v. Alabama, 395 U.S. 238 , 89 S.Ct. 1709 , 23 L.Ed.2d 274 (1969) ]. Because such a plea amounts to an admission of all of the elements of the crime charged, “it cannot be truly voluntary unless the defendant possesses an understanding of the law in relation to the facts.” Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 466 , 58 S.Ct. 1019, 1023 , 82 L.Ed. 1461 (1938). It is elementary that a plea entered in reliance on the defendant’s attorney’s patently erroneous statement of the law in relation to the facts does not meet this standard.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Teague v. State

3. “'[A]lthough counsel need not be a fortune teller, he must be a reasonably competent legal historian. Though he need not see into the future, he must reasonably recall (or at least research) the past....'”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. United States v. Leonard