Commonwealth v. Townsend’s Empirical Analysis
1968
Citation profile
98 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 98 later decisions — most recently May 2011 · most notably Commonwealth v. Shaffer (1972), Commonwealth v. MacOlino (1983)
98 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 Patterson v. Medberry · Commonwealth v. Clinton · State v. Tully · Commonwealth v. Whitman · 167 Pa. Super. 642 - Commonwealth v. Thurman
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 98 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“. . . in a prosecution based upon circumstantial evidence, conviction may not be based upon suspicion or conjecture, but rather the evidence must be such `as reasonably and naturally to justify an inference of the guilt of the accused . . . and of such volume and quality as to overcome the presumption of innocence . . .'”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“rely on its contention that mere presence in a vehicle containing two weapons is sufficient to sustain a finding of guilt.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“`. . . the power of control over the weapon and the intention to exercise this control.'”
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.