Commonwealth v. Walker’s Empirical Analysis
2005
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 2 district · 56 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 61 later decisions — most recently September 2021 · most notably Commonwealth v. Acevedo (2006), Commonwealth v. Kolenovic (2015)
2 federal appellate · 2 district · 56 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 v. Saferian · Commonwealth v. Wright · Commonwealth v. Satterfield · Commonwealth v. Adams · Commonwealth v. Stewart
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 61 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The defendant went to the AmVets bar in Haverhill on Thanksgiving evening, November 25, 1999. At one point he had a quiet conservation with Johnnie Powell, a woman with whom he had a dating relationship that Powell had ended several months earlier. The defendant was neither intoxicated nor upset. Tyrone Davis, the victim, was also in the bar, drinking and mingling with other patrons. At about 12:45 A.M. Davis propositioned Powell as she walked to the bathroom. An argument ensued that quickly drew the attention of the defendant. Davis apologized to Powell several times, but she would not relent. The defendant approached and said, “Leave it alone. Let it go.” Davis and the defendant began to argue, and the defendant said, “You don’t want to mess with me. Somebody’s going to bleed.” The bartender intervened, telling the defendant to leave and directing Davis to remain inside the bar. The bartender followed the defendant outside. As the bartender was returning to the bar, he was met by Davis. The bartender told him to wait inside for a while, but Davis said, “Screw this,” and pushed past him. The defendant and Davis argued for several minutes in the parking lot. A number of patrons, including some friends of Davis, gathered around to watch, but otherwise they did not become involved. The defendant said, “I want to get to my car. No one is pushing me there” and, “If you mess with me you’ll be on the ground.” The defendant did not attempt to back away or go to his car. Davis, who w”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“The proper standard for determining whether a defendant's particular actions were justifiably undertaken in self-defense depends on the level of force he used on his victim and the circumstances that prompted those actions.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“a voluntary manslaughter verdict based on excessive force in self- defense would have been precluded if the Commonwealth proved that the defendant was not entitled to use deadly force”
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.