Gerstein v. Pugh’s Empirical Analysis
1975
Citation profile
2,179 federal appellate · 579 district · 2,440 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 7,779 later decisions (168 by the Supreme Court) — most recently March 2026 · most notably Bell v. Wolfish (1979), Payton v. New York (1980)
2,179 federal appellate · 579 district · 2,440 state decisions — followed in 49 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.
Appellate journey
reviewedPugh v. Rainwater (from Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Terry v. Ohio · Wong Sun v. United States · Morrissey v. Brewer · Younger v. Harris · Wolff v. McDonnell
Cited together with Sosna v. Iowa · Beck v. State of Ohio · Younger v. Harris · Bell v. Wolfish · Frisbie v. Collins
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 7,779 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“sufficient to warrant a prudent man in believing that the [suspect] had committed or was committing an offense.”
275 later decisions quote this exact passage“capable of repetition, yet evading review”
89 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the concurrence“the Fourth Amendment requires a judicial determination of probable cause as a prerequisite to extended restraint of liberty following arrest.”
49 later decisions quote this exact passage
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.