Bates v. Bell’s Empirical Analysis
402 F.3d 635 · 2005
Citation profile
30 federal appellate · 1 district · 6 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 69 later decisions — most recently March 2026 · most notably Joseph v. Coyle (2006), Broom v. Mitchell (2006)
30 federal appellate · 1 district · 6 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 Boykin v. Alabama · Brecht v. Abrahamson · Berger v. United States · United States v. Young · Lockett v. Ohio
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 69 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“(1) the likelihood that the remarks of the prosecutor tended to mislead the jury or prejudice the defendant; (2) whether the remarks were isolated or extensive; (3) whether the remarks were deliberately or accidentally made; and (4) the total strength of the evidence against the defendant.”
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[t]he personal opinion of the prosecutors was primarily reserved for evaluating the testimony of the defense's one disinterested witness, Dr. Griffin. [The defendant's] case for mitigation rested on Dr. Griffin and [the defendant's] mother, and the prosecutors repeatedly undermined Dr. Griffin's testimony by suggesting they did not believe it.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[t]he prosecutor’s unnecessary and intolerable conduct injected such vitriol into the proceedings, as to question the fairness of the entire sentencing hearing.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Durr v. Mitchell · State v. Redcap
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.