Manocchio v. Moran’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

31 federal appellate · 3 district · 13 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 53 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “There are good reasons why the unavailability rule, developed in cases involving former testimony, is not applicable to co-conspirators’ out-of-court statements. Unlike some other exceptions to the hearsay rules, or the exemption from the hearsay definition involved in this case, former testimony is only a weaker substitute for live testimony. It seldom has independent evidentiary significance of its own, but is intended to replace live testimony. If the declarant is available and the same information can be presented to the trier of fact in the form of live testimony, with full cross-examination and the opportunity to view the demean- or of the declarant, there is little justification for relying on the weaker version. When two versions of the same evidence are available, longstanding principles of the law of hearsay, applicable as well to Confrontation Clause analysis, favor the better evidence. But if the declarant is unavailable, no “better” version of the evidence exists, and the former testimo ny may be admitted as a substitute for live testimony on the same point. Those same principles do not apply to co-conspirator statements. Because they are made while the conspiracy is in progress, such statements provide evidence of the conspiracy’s context that cannot be replicated, even if the declar-ant testifies to the same matters in court. ****** The admission of co-conspirators’ declarations into evidence thus actually furthers the “Confrontation Clause’s very mission” whic”

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

2. “the Medical Examiner’s Office is required simply to investigate unnatural deaths; it refers a death bearing any indicium of criminality to the appropriate district attorney and has no responsibility for enforcing any laws. The chief medical examiner and his assistants are required to be physicians and pathologists; there is no requirement in the Charter that they be attorneys or that any employees of the office have any law enforcement training. Even when a matter is referred to the district attorney because of an indication of criminality, the Charter does not give the medical examiner any responsibility for collecting evidence or determining the identity of the perpetrator. Further, though law enforcement activities are typically accusatory and adversarial in nature, a medical examiner’s reported observations as to a body's condition are normally made as part of an independent effort to determine a cause of death. Indeed, "a medical examiner, although often called a forensic expert, bears more similarity to a treating physician than he does to one who is merely rendering an opinion for use in the trial of a case.””

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

3. “The autopsy reports in this case are official records kept in the regular and usual course of the performance by the medical examiner of this official duties. Their reliability is underscored by the rigid requirements of the New York statute that the examiner who performs the autopsy be a “doctor of medicine and a skilled pathologist and microscopist,” and that he record and specify in detail his findings.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 205 W. Va. 224 - State v. Kennedy