Bell v. Ohio’s Empirical Analysis
1978
Citation profile
74 federal appellate · 3 district · 160 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 315 later decisions (35 by the Supreme Court) — most recently December 2024 · most notably Lockett v. Ohio (1978), Eddings v. Oklahoma (1982)
74 federal appellate · 3 district · 160 state decisions — followed in 15 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 Gregg v. Georgia · Furman v. Georgia · Lockett v. Ohio · California v. Southland Royalty Co.
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 315 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“any aspect of a defendant's character or record and any of the circumstances of the offense that the defendant proffers as a basis for a sentence less than death.”
6 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““Mitigating circumstances shall be any factors proffered by the defendant or the state which are relevant in determining whether to impose a sentence less than death, including any aspect of the defendant’s character, propensities or record and any of the circumstances of the offense * * * jy”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. State v. Zaragoza“the defendant must bear the risk of nonpersuasion as to the existence of mitigating factors.”
1 later decision 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.