Commonwealth v. Johnson’s Empirical Analysis
1973
Citation profile
109 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 111 later decisions — most recently October 2014 · most notably Commonwealth v. DeHart (1986), Commonwealth v. England (1977)
109 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. Eiland · Commonwealth v. Lopinson · Commonwealth. v. Hoss · Commonwealth v. McGrew · Commonwealth v. Stafford
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 111 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"The law recognizes that it would be unrealistic to expect jurors to be free from all prejudices, a failing common to all human beings. We can only attempt to have them put aside those prejudices in the performance of their duty, the determination of guilt or innocence." Id. at 136 , 305 A.2d at 8 .”
10 later decisions quote this exact passage“"The examination of jurors under voir dire is solely for the purpose of securing a competent, fair, impartial, and unprejudiced jury . . . [C]ounsel. . . should [not] be permitted . . . to ask direct or hypothetical questions designed to disclose what a juror's present impression or opinion may be or what his attitude or decision will likely be under certain facts which may be developed in the trial of the case. While considerable latitude should be permitted on a voir dire, the inquiry should be strictly confined to disclosing qualifications or lack of qualifications of a juror and whether a juror has formed a fixed opinion or may be otherwise subject to disqualification for cause. * * * * * * * * "It is also well settled that the scope of a voir dire examination rests in the sound discretion of the trial Judge and his decisions, even in a challenge for cause, will not be reversed in the absence of palpable error.. . ."”
7 later decisions 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.