State v. Timmendequas’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 federal appellate · 10 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 11 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Unlike direct review, proportionality review does not question whether an individual death sentence is justified by the facts and circumstances of the case or whether, in the abstract, the sentence imposed on a defendant is deserved on a moral level. On the contrary, its role is to place the sentence imposed for one terrible murder on a continuum of sentences imposed for other terrible murders to ensure that the defendant “has not been singled out unfairly for capital punishment.” [State v. Timmendequas, 168 N.J. 20, 746 , 773 A.2d 18 (2001) (internal citations omitted) (Long, J., dissenting) (slip op. at 1-2).]”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. State v. DiFrisco · State v. Papasavvas

2. “Indeed, the permeable boundaries of the process; its flaecidity; the constant change in standards from case to case; the utterly subjective way in which even legitimate standards are applied; and the consistent practice of the Court to focus only on the aggravating aspects of the case under review while underscoring the mitigating factors of the comparison cases allows the Court to conclude that virtually any death sentence is proportional. [ Timmendequas, supra, 168 N.J. at 78 , 773 A.2d 18 (Long, J., dissenting).]”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. State v. Wakefield

3. “not because it is not terribly real, but because it is universal and thus cannot serve as a basis to distinguish between defendants. Morton II, supra, 165 N.J. at 293 [ 757 A.2d 184 ] (Long, J., dissenting) (criticizing Court’s application of the “non-decedent victim factor” to “every case in which the victim was a ‘unique person’ with a ‘web of familial relations’ — in other words, to every single murder case”) (citation omitted). [ Timmendequas, supra, 168 N.J. at 83 , 773 A.2d 18 (Long, J., dissenting).]”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. State v. Wakefield