Cottrell v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis
1948
Citation profile
12 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 12 later decisions — most recently October 1990
12 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 Powell v. State of Alabama Patterson · Betts v. Brady · Avery v. State of Alabama · Carter v. People of State of Illinois · Canizio v. People of State of New York
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 12 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““The said Arthur William Fitzgerald was this day again brought into Court in the custody of the jailor and set to the bar, and being arraigned upon said indictment, pleaded ‘not guilty.’ And the said accused, with his consent, and the concurrence of the 'Attorney for the Commonwealth, and of the Court, all hereby entered of record, waived a jury for his trial on said indictment, and, thereupon, the Court proceeded to hear and determine this case without the intervention of a jury, the jury having been waived as aforesaid, and having heard all the evidence adduced for both the Commonwealth and the accused, doth adjudge the said accused to be guilty as charged in the said indictment, and doth fix his punishment at confinement for three (3) years in the penitentiary. “And for reasons satisfactory to the Court, and it appearing proper so to do, the Court doth suspend two (2) years of the three (3) year sentence imposed upon the said Arthur William Fitzgerald for a period of ten (10) years, during the good behavior of the said accused or until the further order of this Court.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Fitzgerald v. Smyth“It has frequently happened when evidence produced has established guilt so clearly that it would be hopeless to try to combat it ... . Evidently [the evidence] was adequate to establish guilt and to persuade the defendant and his attorney that the wiser course was to admit his guilt and hope for a lighter punishment from the court than from the jury.”
1 later decision 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.