Shanks v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis
1965
Citation profile
8 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 8 later decisions — most recently November 1980
8 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 Maulding v. Commonwealth · Bartley v. Commonwealth · Lambert 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 8 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"It has long been the law in this state that, if the intention to kill is present, the doctrine of involuntary manslaughter has no place in the case. .. . ..... "... Where a deadly weapon was used, and where the accused admits that he was attempting to defend and protect himself with the deadly weapon, there is no room for argument that he did not intend the result of the actions taken by him. ..... "... By his own testimony his action was taken, not merely in disregard or indifference of the rights of another, but for the purpose of defending and protecting himself. It is hardly consistent to say that appellant was doing what he could to defend himself but at the same time doing it wantonly or recklessly. His use of a knife, a deadly weapon, while engaged in a fight with the deceased precludes the supposition that such action would fall within the purview of the statute defining involuntary manslaughter."”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. State v. Griffiths““(2) Any person who causes the death' of a human being by reckless conduct according to the standard of conduct of a reasonable man under the circumstances shall be guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the second degree and shall be imprisoned in the county jail for a term not exceeding twelve (12) months or fined a sum not exceeding five thousand dollars ($5,000) or both.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage““Where a deadly weapon was used, and where the accused admits that he was attempting to defend and protect himself with the deadly weapon, there is no room for argument that he did not intend the result of the action taken by him.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage
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.