57 Va. App. 341 - Williams v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

9 state decisions

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 9 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[w]hen construing penal statutes which contain qualifications, exceptions or exemptions to their application, the limiting language may be viewed as a negative element of the offense which the prosecution must disprove. See Regular Veterans Ass’n, Ladies Auxiliary v. Commonwealth, 18 Va.App. 683, 690 , 446 S.E.2d 621, 625 (1994) (Benton, J., dissenting) (citing State v. Young [ 185 W.Va. 327 ], 406 S.E.2d 758, 774 (W.Va.1991); State v. Ingram [ 98 N.J. 489 ], 488 A.2d 545, 546-47 (N.J.1985)). Alternately, the court may determine that the exemption is a statutory defense, which the accused can assert to defeat the prima facie case of the prosecution. Regular Veterans, 18 Va.App. at 688 , 446 S.E.2d at 624 (where a statute “defines completely the offense therein specified and its required elements of proof[, n]egation of circumstances invoking [an exemption else where in the same Code section] is not one of those elements. [The accused bears] the burden of producing evidence [of the negation of circumstances] sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt of [his] guilt”). In determining whether specific limiting language is an element of the offense or a statutory defense, a court should look both to the intent of the statute as a whole and the ability of the respective parties to assert the existence or absence of the underlying facts sustaining the applicability of the limitation.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 58 Va. App. 681 - Flanagan v. Commonwealth