Davis v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 63 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 68 later decisions — most recently March 2024 · most notably Cable v. Commonwealth (1992), Barker v. Commonwealth (1985)
3 federal appellate · 63 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 King v. Commonwealth · Tuggle v. Commonwealth · United States v. Saitta · Gooden v. Commonwealth · Lomax 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 68 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“A legal duty is one either “imposed by law, or by contract.” Pierce v. Commonwealth, 135 Va. 635, 651 , 115 S.E. 686, 691 (1923). When a death results from an omission to perform a legal duty, the person obligated to perform the duty may be guilty of culpable homicide. Biddle v. Commonwealth, 206 Va. 14, 20 , 141 S.E.2d 710, 714 (1965); Pierce, 135 Va. at 651 , 115 S.E. at 691 . If the death results from a malicious omission of the performance of a duty, the offense is murder. On the other hand, although no malice is shown, if a person is criminally negligent in omitting to perform a duty, he is guilty of involuntary manslaughter. Biddle, 206 Va. at 20 , 141 S.E.2d at 714 .”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“When a discovery violation does not prejudice the substantial rights of the defendant, a trial court does not err in admitting undisclosed evidence.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“Davis was more than a mere volunteer; she had a legal duty, not merely a moral one, to care for her mother.”
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.