State v. Curtis’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

22 state decisions

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 22 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “In Templin , the Utah Supreme Court reversed a rape conviction because defense counsel failed to interview a witness “who would have testified that she saw defendant and the victim kissing passionately for over fifteen minutes ... at the address of and within an hour of the rape reported by the victim.” This testimony, the court noted, would have contradicted the victim’s testimony, which was “the only direct evidence of [the defendant’s] guilt.” But the court also mentioned in a footnote that failing to interview and call another witness was not ineffective assistance because even though the defendant “provided ... ah affidavit stating that [the witness] was never contacted by trial counsel,” he did not provide “any evidence concerning what [the witness] would have testified to ... [at] trial.” “Therefore,” the court held, the defendant could not show “a reasonable probability that the result of his trial would have been different” had the witness testified.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. State v. Burnside

2. “Without nonspeculative evidence establishing what each witness could have testified to at trial, Curtis has not shown that any deficient performance by trial counsel in failing to interview them was “so serious” that it “deprivefd] [him] of a fair trial,” and “that there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different[.]””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. State v. Burnside

3. “(1) contain a nonspeculative allegation of facts that (2) do not fully appear in the record, which, if true, (3) could support a determination that counsel's performance was deficient, and (4) demonstrate that the defendant suffered prejudice as a result.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. State v. Biebinger