United States v. Evans’s Empirical Analysis
481 F.2d 990 · 1973
Citation profile
39 federal appellate · 1 district · 18 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 61 later decisions (3 by the Supreme Court) — most recently July 1999 · most notably United States v. Ross (1982), United States v. Chadwick (1977)
39 federal appellate · 1 district · 18 state decisions — followed in 14 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 26 U.S.C. § 5861 (§ 201 of the Gun Control Act of 1968)
Relies on Carroll v. United States · Aguilar v. Texas · Coolidge v. New Hampshire · Spinelli v. United States · Chambers v. Maroney
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 61 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““Arguably, because of the preference for a magistrate’s judgment, only the immobilization of the car should be permitted until a search warrant is obtained; arguably, only the ‘lesser’ intrusion is permissible until the magistrate authorizes the ‘greater.’ But which is thé ‘greater’ and which the ‘lesser’ intrusion is itself a debatable question and the answer may depend on a variety of circumstances. For constitutional purposes, we see no difference between on the one hand seizing and holding a car before presenting the probable cause issue to a magistrate and on the other hand carrying out an immediate search without a warrant. Given probable cause to search, either course is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. 399 U.S. at 51-52 , 90 S.Ct. at 1981 .” . [I]t is easy to say that the footlocker could be confiscated by the police and taken to the magistrate, but a seizing would then have already occurred — a substantial interference. Standing guard still represents the same interference with property rights as well as an unnecessary use of law enforcement personnel. Under these circumstances, either course might be reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, but the immediate search was preferable.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“police could reasonably believe the evidence might evaporate through the efforts of Evans' girlfriend who owned and had a right to immediate possession of the vehicle”
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.