Commonwealth v. Rafferty’s Empirical Analysis
1991
Citation profile
65 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 65 later decisions — most recently December 2018 · most notably Jamborsky v. Baskins (1994), 27 Va. App. 697 - Lebedun v. Commonwealth (1998)
65 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 United Housing Foundation, Inc. v. Forman · Clozza v. Bair · Shiflet v. Eller · Payne v. Commonwealth · Deaner 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 65 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“If the General Assembly intended to [make refusal a criminal offense], the 1977 amendment simply could have provided that an unreasonable refusal to submit to [a blood or breath] test is a misdemeanor and not an administrative and civil proceeding. Additionally, such an amendment would have given the right to a jury trial and required proof beyond a reasonable doubt, without the necessity of men- Honing them, because both are inherent in criminal prosecutions.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[a] statute directing the mode of proceeding by public officers is to be deemed directory, and a precise compliance is not to be deemed essential to the validity of the proceedings, unless so declared by statute.” Id. at 324-25 , 402 S.E.2d at 20 (quoting Nelms v. Vaughan, 84 Va. 696, 699 , 5 S.E. 704, 706 (1888)). Accordingly, the use of the word”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“regulate[d] the procedure on appeal, Rafferty's substantive right of appeal [was] regulated by Code § 8.01-670, which authorizes an appeal to this Court by 'any person ... aggrieved ... [b]y a final judgment in any other civil case.' Thus, this Court has jurisdiction.”
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.