401 Pa. Super. 300 - Commonwealth v. Munchinski’s Empirical Analysis
1990
Citation profile
3 federal appellate · 17 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 26 later decisions — most recently July 2013 · most notably Commonwealth v. Chmiel (1999), 436 Pa. Super. 277 - Commonwealth v. Smith (1994)
3 federal appellate · 17 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 Commonwealth Ex Rel. Washington v. Maroney · Commonwealth v. Pierce · Commonwealth v. Dugger · Commonwealth v. Pettus · Government of Virgin Islands v. Smith
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 26 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“It is not necessary to find the appellant guilty of a felony before a finding of [felony] murder.... What is required is that the actor be found guilty of a homicide in the progress of committing a felony with sufficient evidence to establish a felony was in process and the killing occurred. Whether or not the statute of limitations has run on the underlying felony is immaterial, so long as the essential elements of [felony] murder are proven beyond a reasonable doubt.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passagee.g. People v. Doubleday · State v. Grey“On the night of December 1, 1977, the defendant, [David Joseph] Munchinski, met with Leon E. Scaglione, (hereafter called “Scaglione”), and Richard A. Bowen, (hereafter called “Bowen”), at “Harry’s Bar” in Greensburg. Bowen was introduced to the defendant by Scaglione, who he had known for several years. Scaglione and the defendant told Bowen that they were going to Bear Rocks “to rip-off some drugs” and wanted Bowen to drive the car. (N.T. 179). Bowen agreed, and drove Scaglione and Munchinski to a cabin in Bear Rocks. Scaglione told Bowen to stop the car. Both Scaglione and the defendant exited the car and disappeared in the direction of the cabin. While sitting in the car, Bowen heard the sound of nails being pulled. After a few minutes, Scaglione returned to the car and asked Bowen to come into the cabin, telling him “that I would like this, or I would dig this.” (T. 181). After entering the cabin, Bowen saw Munchinski “with a gun in his hand holding two fellows at gun point.” (N.T. 181). Scaglione then demanded that the two men give them the drugs. They responded that they didn’t have any. Scaglione then forced one of the men to take his pants off, and Scaglione sodomized him, (N.T. 182-183), after which Munchinski “did the same thing to the other fellow he had the gun on.” (N.T. 183). Afterwards, Munchinski and the man on whom he was holding the gun went into another room and “returned with a little jewelry box which was full of little bags of white powder.” (Id.) Scagl”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Munchinski v. Wilson
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.