People v. Blades’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

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 4 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “... Marshall’s allocution statements ... are not demonstrably reliable, and the deprivation of Blades’ ability to confront Marshall at trial, thus, constitutes error. íjí íjí There is overwhelming evidence of guilt, however, in this case, including the almost comical, virtually caught red-handed act of discarding evidence at every step and turn away from the crime scene. Moreover, as noted previously, the trial court in its jury instructions expressly limited the use of the allocution to the issue of whether Blades acted in concert with another. As this was not an element to be established for his conviction of burglary in the first degree, the introduction of the Marshall allocution for that limited purpose cannot be said, in the circumstances and context of this case, to have had a possible prejudicial impact on the jury’s verdict on that crime. [On the other counts, Blades received Lesser concurrent sentences.] We are, therefore, satisfied that the case is an appropriate candidate for the application of the deus ex machina— harmless error ....”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 167 F. Supp. 2d 628 - Blades v. Miller