State v. Rhines’s Empirical Analysis
1996
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 1 district · 73 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 77 later decisions — most recently June 2025 · most notably State v. Bland (1997), State v. Hanna (2002)
2 federal appellate · 1 district · 73 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 Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera · Batson v. Kentucky · Gregg v. Georgia · Witherspoon v. Illinois · Furman v. Georgia
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 77 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(1) The offense was committed by a person with a prior record of conviction for a Class A or Class B felony, or the offense of murder was committed by a person who has a felony conviction for a crime of violence as defined in subdivision 22-1-2(9); (2) The defendant by the defendant’s act knowingly created a great risk of death to more than one person in a public place by means of a weapon or device which would normally be hazardous to the lives of more than one person; (3) The defendant committed the offense for the benefit of the defendant or another, for the purpose of receiving money or any other thing of monetary value; (4) The defendant committed the offense on a judicial officer, former judicial officer, prosecutor, or former prosecutor while such prosecutor, former prosecutor, judicial officer, or former judicial officer was engaged in the performance of such person’s official duties or where a major part of the motivation for the offense came from the official actions of such judicial officer, former judicial officer, prosecutor, or former prosecutor; (5) The defendant caused or directed another to commit murder or committed murder as an agent or employee of another person; (6) The offense was outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible, or inhuman in that it involved torture, depravity of mind, or an aggravated battery to the victim. Any murder is wantonly vile, horrible, and inhuman if the victim is less than thirteen years of age; (7) The offense was committed against”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrencee.g. State v. Moeller · Rhines v. Weber“We conclude that similar cases for purposes of SDCL 23A-27A-12(3) are those cases in which a capital sentencing proceeding was actually conducted, whether the sentence imposed was life or death. “Because the aim of proportionality review is to ascertain what other capital sentencing authorities have done with similar capital murder offenses, the only cases that could be deemed similar ... are those in which imposition of the death penalty was properly before the sentencing authority for determination.””
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrencee.g. State v. Robert · State v. Berget“(1) Whether the sentence of death was imposed under the influence of passion, prejudice, or any other arbitrary factor; and (2) Whether the evidence supports the jury’s or judge’s finding of a statutory aggravating circumstance as enumerated in § 23A-27A-1; and (3) Whether the sentence of death is excessive or disproportionate to the penalty imposed in similar cases, considering both the crime and the defendant.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrencee.g. State v. Moeller · State v. Piper
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.