Foster v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis
1942
Citation profile
58 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 60 later decisions — most recently July 2018 · most notably Jones v. Commonwealth (1967), 16 Va. App. 82 - Pugliese v. Commonwealth (1993)
58 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.
Relationships
Relies on Brown v. Commonwealth · James v. Commonwealth · Kemp v. Commonwealth · Triplett v. Commonwealth · Hitt v. Commonwealth
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 60 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[P]roof that a person is present at the commission of a crime without disapproving or opposing it, is evidence from which, in connection with other circumstances, it is competent for the jury to infer that he assented thereto, lent to it his countenance and approval, and was thereby aiding and abetting the same.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“A principal in the second degree is one not the perpetrator, but present, aiding and abetting the act done, or keeping watch or guard at some convenient distance. . . . Every person who is present at the commission of a [crime], encouraging or inciting the same by words, gestures, looks, or signs, or who in any way, or by any means, countenances or approves the same is, in law, assumed to be an aider and abettor, and is liable as principal.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.