Kates v. Commonwealth

Decided April 15, 1867

Supreme Court of Virginia · decided 1867-04-15

This was an indictment in the Circuit court. of Bedford county against Rucinda Kates, a colored woman, for the murder of her child. On the trial the jury found her guilty of voluntary manslaughter, and fixed the term of her imprisonment in the penitentiary at eighteen months. The prisoner asked for a new trial, on the ground that the verdict was contrary to the evidence; but the court overruled the motion, and sentenced her in accordance with the verdict.

Relies on Vaiden v. Commonwealth

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1867-04-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently March 1907

5 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.

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MONCURE, P.,

¶1delivered the opinion of the court:

¶2The court, although of opinion that the evidence in this case does not clearly show either that the child was born alive or that it came to its death by the act or neglect of the mother, is yet of opinion that, according to the principles laid down by this court in the case of Vaiden v. The Commonwealth, 12 Gratt. 717, the said evidence is not so plainly insufficient to warrant the verdict as to authorize this court to reverse the judgment. Therefore it is considered by the court that there is no error in the said judgment, and that it be affirmed.

¶3Judgment affirmed.