Smith v. Stewart’s Empirical Analysis
189 F.3d 1004 · 1999
Citation profile
19 federal appellate · 4 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 40 later decisions — most recently March 2023 · most notably Commonwealth v. Basemore (2000), Kenneth G. Pavel v. Melvin L. Hollins, Superintendent, Oneida Correctional Facility Eliot L. Spitzer, Attorney General of New York State (2001)
19 federal appellate · 4 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 Strickland v. Washington · Boykin v. Alabama · Bonin v. Calderon · Jeffries v. Wood · State v. Watson
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 40 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“defense counsel effectively presented no mitigating evidence at sentencing, despite the presence of aggravating factors.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“On January 1, 1976, officials of the Maricopa County Sheriffs Department found the nude body of Sandy Spencer in the desert outside Phoenix. One month later in a different desert location, police discovered the nude body of Neva Lee. Both teenage hitchhikers had been suffocated by having dirt forced into their mouths, which were taped shut. The assailant stabbed both women multiple times, punctured them with needles, and bound their wrists with rope. Smith, who was on probation from a rape conviction, became the prime suspect. Police put him under surveillance. When that failed to produce probable cause for an arrest, police had a female officer pose as a hitchhiker to lure Smith into committing falsé imprisonment or battery. He eventually picked up the officer, took her to his 'father’s machine shop, and grabbed her by both arms. After a prearranged signal, police entered and arrested him for false imprisonment. During Smith’s imprisonment, police questioned him about the Lee and Spencer murders. At first, he denied his involvement. But months later, at his own initiation, Smith gave investigators a bizarre account of the Lee slaying. He told police that he was present at the crime because a friend, John Jameson, forced him at gunpoint to drive the victim to the desert. Once there, Jameson ordered Lee to have sexual intercourse with Smith in order to frame Smith for her rape. Smith said Jameson then decided to kill Lee. His account conflicted with some physical evidence foun”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Smith v. Ryan“The failure to present mitigating evidence during the penalty phase of a capital case, where there are no tactical considerations involved, constitutes deficient performance, since competent counsel would have made an effective case for mitigation.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Summerlin v. Schriro
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.