Heiser v. Ryan’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

3 federal appellate · 1 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 8 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “The Commonwealth has shown that the delay has not affected the participants’ memories of the critical events. Although the passage of time has resulted in some diminution of memories, Heiser’s ability to prove that his guilty plea was coerced was not prejudiced by the delay. Attorney Martin’s testimony is unequivocal: he did not and would never make the type of threat alleged. The court does not believe that the passage of time has affected Martin’s memory regarding this ultimate question.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Heiser v. Ryan

2. “[w]hile not compelling relief in every case where bad-faith delay would make relief virtually automatic, neither is negligence automatically tolerable simply because the accused cannot demonstrate exactly how it has prejudiced him.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 2004 Pa. Super. 400 - Commonwealth v. Neff