Gallimore v. Commonwealth

I join in all of the plurality opinion except its attempt to abolish the common-law and statutory classification of parties to a felony in cases of involuntary manslaughter. If such abolition is advisable, it should be done by the General Assembly, not by judicial fiat.

The General Assembly and this Court have already spoken on the subject. Code § 18.2-18 provides, in pertinent part, that “[i]n the case of every felony, every principal in the second degree and every accessory before the fact may be indicted, tried, convicted and punished in all respects as if a principal in the first degree.”…