Downs v. Swann’s Empirical Analysis
1909
Citation profile
13 federal appellate · 2 district · 43 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 64 later decisions — most recently July 2016 · most notably Don Morrow v. District of Columbia, in the Matter of Harry T. Alexander, Judge, District of Columbia Court of General Sessions (1969), Carr v. Watkins (1962)
13 federal appellate · 2 district · 43 state decisions — followed in 12 states
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 Henning Jacobson v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts · Crowley v. Christensen · Augustus Reetz v. People of the State of Michigan · State v. Broadbelt · Ford v. State
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 64 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“populous communities which now exist, and the modern facilities for swift and frequent communications and rapid transit, afford hitherto unknown facilities for evading arrest or fleeing from justice, which should be offset in the public interest by providing the agencies, charged with the duty of preserving the public peace and arresting persons reasonably suspected of the commission of crimes, with the most efficient means of detecting and identifying them * * *.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“it is necessary to the proper enforcement of police regulations and the securing of the prisoner for trial that a full description of him should be had in order that, if he should undertake to become a fugitive from justice, the police and detective department may be in possession of such information as will enable them to have him identified, wherever he may be found . . .”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. (2007)“* * * it does not allege the existence of a custom to put the photographs of unconvicted persons in the rogues' gallery, or charge the defendants with a purpose to put Downs' picture there, but only with an intention to preserve it for the use of the department.”
1 later decision 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.