Hill v. Lockhart’s Empirical Analysis
1985
Citation profile
2,567 federal appellate · 674 district · 5,161 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 12,190 later decisions (33 by the Supreme Court) — most recently June 2026 · most notably Moran v. Burbine (1986), Padilla v. Kentucky (2010)
2,567 federal appellate · 674 district · 5,161 state decisions — followed in 48 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
reviewedBeans v. Black (from Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Strickland v. Washington · Boykin v. Alabama · North Carolina v. Alford · Powell v. State of Alabama Patterson
Cited together with Strickland v. Washington · McMann v. Richardson · North Carolina v. Alford · Brady v. United States · Boykin v. Alabama
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 12,190 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel's errors, he would not have pleaded guilty and would have insisted on going to trial.”
673 later decisions quote this exact passage“there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel's unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different.”
108 later decisions quote this exact passage“within the range of competence demanded of attorneys in criminal cases.”
35 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.