Delaware v. Fensterer’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
834 federal appellate · 70 district · 1,255 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 2,821 later decisions (28 by the Supreme Court) — most recently February 2026 · most notably Delaware v. Van Arsdall (1986), Pennsylvania v. Ritchie (1987)
834 federal appellate · 70 district · 1,255 state decisions — followed in 47 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 Bruton v. United States · Davis v. Alaska · Ohio v. Roberts · California v. Green · Dutton v. Evans
Cited together with Delaware v. Van Arsdall · Davis v. Alaska · California v. Green · Crawford v. Washington · Ohio v. Roberts
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 2,821 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“the Confrontation Clause guarantees an opportunity for effective cross-examination, not cross-examination that is effective in whatever way, and to whatever extent, the defense might wish.”
173 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The Confrontation Clause includes no guarantee that every witness called by the prosecution will refrain from giving testimony that is marred by forgetfulness, confusion, or evasion. To the contrary, the Confrontation Clause is generally satisfied when the defense is given a full and fair opportunity to probe and expose these infirmities through cross-examination, thereby calling to the attention of the factfinder the reasons for giving scant weight to the witness’ testimony.”
40 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“effectively ... emasculate the right of cross-examination itself.”
35 later decisions 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.