Mitchell v. United States’s Empirical Analysis
259 F.2d 787 · 1958
Citation profile
146 federal appellate · 7 district · 73 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 252 later decisions — most recently December 1995 · most notably People v. Ibarra (1963), Commonwealth v. Saferian (1974)
146 federal appellate · 7 district · 73 state decisions — followed in 19 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 Glasser v. United States · Johnson v. Zerbst · Powell v. State of Alabama Patterson · Von Moltke v. Gillies · Betts v. Brady
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 252 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“"If a movant under Section 2255 makes no allegations of ineffectiveness or incompetence of counsel, save in matters normally within the realm of counsel's judgment, he is not entitled to a hearing. Under such circumstances a hearing would be useless, an inexcusable waste of time, energy and money, because even if the movant proved what he alleged he would not be entitled to relief."”
13 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“(a) A prisoner in custody under sentence of the Superior Court claiming the right to be released upon the ground that (I) the sentence was imposed in violation of the Constitution of the United States or the laws of the District of Columbia, (2) the court was without jurisdiction to impose the sentence, (3) the sentence was in excess of the maximum authorized by law, (4) the sentence is otherwise subject to collateral attack, may move the court to vacate, set aside, or correct the sentence. (b) A motion for such relief may be made at any time. (c) Unless the motion and files and records of the case conclusively show that the prisoner is entitled to no relief, the court shall cause notice thereof to be served upon the prosecuting authority, grant a prompt hearing thereon, determine the issues, and make findings of fact and conclusions of law with respect thereto. If the court finds that (1) the judgment was rendered without jurisdiction, (2) the sentence imposed was not authorized by law or is otherwise open to collateral attack, (3) there has been such a denial or infringement of the constitutional rights of the prisoner as to render the judgment vulnerable to collateral attack, the court shall vacate and set the judgment aside and shall discharge the prisoner, resentence him, grant a new trial, or correct the sentence, as may appear appropriate.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“"* * * [T]he constitutional right to the effective assistance of counsel does not vest in the accused the right to the services of an attorney who meets any specified aptitude test in point of professional skill. And common mistakes of judgment on the part of counsel, common mistakes of strategy, common mistakes of trial tactics, or common errors of policy in the course of a criminal case do not constitute grounds for collateral attack upon the judgment and sentence by motion under the statute [ 28 U.S.C.A. § 2255 ]. It is instances in which resulting from the substandard level of the services of the attorney the trial becomes mockery and farcical that the judgment is open to collateral attack on the ground that the accused was deprived of his constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel." [2]”
2 later decisions 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.