Commonwealth v. Tilley’s Empirical Analysis
1991
Citation profile
4 federal appellate · 135 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 144 later decisions — most recently March 2023 · most notably Commonwealth v. Abu-Jamal (1998), Commonwealth v. Albrecht (1998)
4 federal appellate · 135 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 Barker v. Wingo · Lockett v. Ohio · American Manufacturers Mutual Insurance v. United States · Proffitt v. Florida · Local 408, International Brotherhood of Teamsters v. National Labor Relations Board
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 144 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(b) UNREASONABLE BELIEF KILLING JUSTIFIABLE — A person who intentionally or knowingly kills an individual commits voluntary manslaughter if at the time of the killing he believes the circumstances to be such that, if they existed, would justify the killing under Chapter 5 of this title, but his belief is unreasonable.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[I]n order to prevail on the instant issue it would be incumbent upon appellant to demonstrate that trial counsel's failure to specifically ask prospective jurors if they would automatically vote to impose the death penalty resulted in the impanelling of a jury on which one or more jurors were so predisposed. * * * The mere fact that counsel may not have posed the specific question as to whether a prospective juror would vote for a sentence of life imprisonment in an appropriate case does not justify the conclusion that counsel failed to assure that a fair and impartial jury was selected. Such a talismanic requirement would clearly place form above substance.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“(i) the sentence of death was the product of passion, prejudice or any other arbitrary factor; (ii) the evidence fails to support the finding of at least one aggravating circumstance specified in subsection (d); or (iii) the sentence of death is excessive or disproportionate to the penalty imposed in similar cases, considering both the circumstances of the crime and the character and record of the defendant.”
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.