Evans v. Commonwealth’s Empirical Analysis
1984
Citation profile
6 federal appellate · 36 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 49 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 2015 · most notably Watkins v. Commonwealth (1985), Quesinberry v. Commonwealth (1991)
6 federal appellate · 36 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 Burks v. United States · Weaver v. Graham · Dobbert v. Florida · United States v. Morrison · Bullington v. Missouri
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 49 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““In assessing the penalty of any person convicted of an offense for which the death penalty may be imposed, a sentence of death shall not be imposed unless the court or jury shall (1) after consideration of the past criminal record of convictions of the defendant, find that there is a probability that the defendant would commit criminal acts of violence that would constitute a continuing serious threat to society or that his conduct in committing the offense for which he stands charged was outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhuman in that it involved torture, depravity of mind or an aggravated battery to the victim; and (2) recommend that the penalty of death be imposed.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“Pertinent to the ex post facto inquiry is whether the defendant had “fair warning as to the degree of culpability which the State ascribed to the act of murder.” [Dobbert, 432 U.S. at 297 , 97 S.Ct. 2290 , 53 L.Ed.2d 344 .] Manifestly, Evans had “fair notice” and “fair warning” at the time of his 1981 offense that the capital murder of a law-enforcement officer was a crime for which the death penalty could be imposed.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. State v. White“the new law provides for impanelling a new jury, free of any taint arising from errors during the first trial, to redetermine the defendant’s punishment. A defendant convicted of capital murder is entitled to a fair and impartial determination of his punishment: he will not be heard to complain that a change in the law which protects that right is not wholly beneficial to him.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Evans v. Thompson
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.