Soffar v. Cockrell’s Empirical Analysis
300 F.3d 588 · 2002
Citation profile
18 federal appellate · 17 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 56 later decisions — most recently July 2024 · most notably 40 Cal. 4th 483 - People v. Smith (2007), United States v. Farley (2010)
18 federal appellate · 17 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
Applies 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996)
Relies on Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera · Schneckloth v. Bustamonte · Johnson v. Zerbst · Williams v. Taylor · Edwards v. Arizona
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 56 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“a statement either is such an assertion of the right to counsel or it is not.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“sufficiently clearly that a reasonable police officer in the circumstances would understand the statement to be a request for an attorney”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent“Soffar asked whether he should talk to the police or obtain an attorney; [the detective] responded that `if he was involved in the crime he should tell the detective he was in it; otherwise he should get a lawyer.' Soffar then asked how he could get a lawyer, and [the detective] asked him if he could afford a lawyer, knowing that he could not. Soffar laughed, and asked how he could get a court-appointed attorney, and when he could get one. [The detective] responded that he did not know Harris County procedures, and guessed that it could take as little as a day or as long as a month. [The detective] knew that [Harris County] had a 72-hour rule ... but did not tell Soffar about it. Soffar then spat into a trash can and said `so you're telling me I'm on my own.' [The detective] remained silent.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Jackson v. Frank
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.