Franks v. Delaware’s Empirical Analysis
1978
Citation profile
4,645 federal appellate · 1,240 district · 4,515 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 14,932 later decisions (44 by the Supreme Court) — most recently January 2026 · most notably Illinois v. Gates (1983), United States v. Leon (1984)
4,645 federal appellate · 1,240 district · 4,515 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.
Relationships
Relies on Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera · Boykin v. Alabama · Mapp v. Ohio · Aguilar v. Texas
Cited together with Illinois v. Gates · United States v. Leon · Spinelli v. United States · Aguilar v. Texas · United States v. Ventresca
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 14,932 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[W]here the defendant makes a substantial preliminary showing that a false statement knowingly and intentionally, or with reckless disregard for the truth, was included by the affiant in the warrant affidavit, and if the allegedly false statement is necessary to the finding of probable cause, the Fourth Amendment requires that a hearing be held at the defendant’s request. In the event that at that hearing the allegation of perjury or reckless disregard is established by the defendant by a preponderance of the evidence, and, with the affidavit’s false material set to one side, the affidavit’s remaining content is insufficient to establish probable cause, the search warrant must be voided and the fruits of the search excluded to the same extent as if probable cause was lacking on the face of the affidavit.”
767 later decisions quote this exact passage“the allegedly false statement is necessary to the finding of probable cause.”
185 later decisions quote this exact passage“Because it is the magistrate who must determine independently whether there is probable cause, it would be an unthinkable imposition upon his authority if a warrant affidavit, revealed after the fact to contain a deliberately or recklessly false statement, were to stand beyond impeachment.”
18 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the dissent
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.