Bigby v. Dretke’s Empirical Analysis
402 F.3d 551 · 2005
Citation profile
37 federal appellate · 4 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 55 later decisions — most recently April 2025 · most notably Pippin v. Dretke (2005), United States v. Skelton (2008)
37 federal appellate · 4 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 Strickland v. Washington · Brady v. State of Maryland · Miller-El v. Cockrell Director Texas Department of Criminal Justice Institutional Division · Williams v. Taylor · Delaware v. Van Arsdall
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 55 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Although Bigby’s history of mental illness was relevant to whether he acted deliberately, it also spoke to his moral culpability.' Importantly, Bigby’s evidence indicated that his schizophrenia was chronic and severe, caused him to suffer delusions with respect to the actions and motivations of the people around him, could not be adequately treated, and significantly impacted his interpersonal relationship abilities. Inquiry into whether Bigby acted deliberately fails to fully account for the potential impact [schizophrenia] may have upon the jury’s perception of Bigby’s moral responsibility for his crimes.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissente.g. Coble v. Dretke · Coble v. Dretke“(1) the decision maker has a direct personal, substantial, and pecuniary interest in the outcome of the case; (2) an adjudicator has been the target of personal abuse or criticism from the party before him; and (3) a judicial or quasi judicial decision maker has the dual role of investigating and adjudicating disputes and complaints.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“We note that the Supreme Court has never explicitly stated that Penry claims cannot be extended beyond claims involving evidence of `mental impairment.' In fact at times, it seems the Court has said the exact opposite.... The only mention the Smith Court made of whether the defendant's evidence was outside the reach of the special issue questions was the Court's single sentence that `just as in Penry II , petitioner's jury was required by law to answer a verdict form that made no mention whatsoever of mitigation evidence. And just as in Penry II , the burden of proof on the State was tied by law to findings of deliberateness and future dangerousness that had little, if anything, to do with the mitigation evidence petitioner presented.'”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Ex Parte Smith
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.