United States v. Powers’s Empirical Analysis
439 F.2d 373 · 1971
Citation profile
20 federal appellate · 22 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 46 later decisions — most recently July 2004 · most notably 95 Wash. 2d 170 - State v. Simpson (1980), State v. Halczyszak (1986)
20 federal appellate · 22 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
Applies 18 U.S.C. § 2312
Relies on Terry v. Ohio · Katz v. United States · Carroll v. United States · Chambers v. Maroney · Preston v. United States
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 46 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[inspection of a car’s identification number differs from a search of a vehicle and seizure of its contents in one important aspect. The occupants of the car cannot harbor an expectation of privacy concerning the identification of the vehicle. The state requires manufacturers to identify vehicles by affixing identification numbers which are also recorded in registries where the police and any interested person may inspect them. Since identification numbers are, at the least, quasi-public information, a search of that part of the car displaying the number is but a minimal invasion of a person’s privacy. A police officer, therefore, should be freer to inspect the number without a warrant than he is to search a car for purely private property.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““ [W] ould the facts available to the officer at the moment of the seizure or the search ‘warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief’ that the action taken was appropriate?””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“But mobility alone does not justify unbridled search of those parts of a vehicle where one has a reasonable expectation of privacy. Thus, warrantless searches of the trunk, the glove compartment, the console or similar areas have been approved only within strict limitations, such as a requirement of probable cause to search the car.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.