Commonwealth v. Hughes’s Empirical Analysis
1989
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 191 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 201 later decisions — most recently March 2021 · most notably Commonwealth v. Hall (1997), Commonwealth v. Eichinger (2007)
2 federal appellate · 191 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 Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera · United States v. Wade · Aguilar v. Texas · Stovall v. Denno · Spinelli v. United States
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 201 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“In addition, we note that the facts and circumstances established by the Commonwealth need not preclude every possibility of innocence. Any doubts regarding a defendant’s guilt may be resolved by the fact-finder unless the evidence is so weak and inconclusive that as a matter of law no probability of fact may be drawn from the combined circumstances. The Commonwealth may sustain its burden of proving every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt by means of wholly circumstantial evidence. Moreover, in applying the above test, the entire record must be evaluated and all evidence actually received must be considered. Finally, the trier of fact while passing upon the credibility of witnesses and the weight of the evidence produced, is free to believe all, part or none of the evidence.”
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“(1) Both crimes involved young females (Graham was nine; Oquendo was twelve); (2) both victims were non-Caucasian (Graham was Negro; Oquendo was Puerto Rican); (3) both crimes occurred during the daytime; (4) both crimes took place within a four-block radius; (5) both crimes took place within a five-minute walk from Appellant’s home; (6) both crimes involved circumstances in which the victim was lured or strong-armed off the street; (7) both victims were taken to upstairs bedrooms of vacant buildings; (8) in both crimes the assailant ordered the victims to undress; (9) both crimes involved rape, other sex acts (Graham was anally; Oquendo was orally), and manual strangulation; and (10) both crimes involved circumstances in which the accused and the victims were previously acquainted.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“Although there is no single litmus-paper test for determining the voluntariness of a confession, it must be established that the decision to speak was a product of a free and unconstrained choice of its maker ... All attending circumstances must be considered in this determination. These include the duration and methods of interrogation; the length of delay between arrest and arraignment; the conditions of detainment; the attitudes of the police toward defendant; defendant’s physical and psychological state; and all other conditions present which may serve to drain one’s power of resistance to suggestion or to undermine one’s self-determination.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.