United States v. Fields’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

63 federal appellate · 4 district · 27 state decisions

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 191 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Where the [Supreme] Court discusses the need for reliability in the Eighth Amendment context, it is not talking about the appropriate sources for information introduced at sentencing or even, more generally, about the reliability of evidence. It is instead focusing on (1) the need to delineate, ex ante, the particular offenses for which death is a proportionate punishment and (2) the need for the jury to be able to consider all factors (particularly mitigating, but also aggravating) relevant to choosing an appropriate punishment once the death penalty is in play.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. United States v. Umaña · United States v. Alejandro Umana

2. “If a jury is having difficulty reaching a unanimous verdict, it is permissible to instruct it “that in a large proportion of cases absolute certainty could not be expected; that, although the verdict must be the verdict of each individual juror, and not a mere acquiescence in the conclusion of his fellows, yet they should examine the question submitted with candor, and with a proper regard and deference to the opinions of each other; that it was their duty to decide the case if they could conscientiously do so; that they should listen, with a disposition to be convinced, to each other’s arguments; that, if much the larger number were for conviction, a dissenting juror should consider whether his doubt was a reasonable one which made no impression upon the minds of so many men, equally honest, equally intelligent with himself. If, on the other hand, the majority were for acquittal, the minority ought to ask themselves whether they might not reasonably doubt the correctness of a judgment which was not concurred in by the majority.” [Allen, 164 U.S. at 501 , 17 S.Ct. 154 .] Any similar supplemental instruction that urges members of a deadlocked jury to forego their differences is now known as an “Allen charge,” or “the dynamite charge, the third degree instruction, the shotgun instruction, or the nitroglycerin charge.” United States v. Bailey, 468 F.2d 652, 666 (5th Cir.1972). This “standard supplemental instruction has been well-received by the nation’s trial court judges. The ”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. United States v. Hill

3. “Rather, all of the challenged statements were introduced as part of the government’s effort to establish [defendant’s] past violent conduct and future dangerousness, both of which are nonstatutory aggravating factors that were included in the government’s notice. The establishment of nonstatutory aggravating factors is neither necessary nor sufficient to authorize imposition of the death penalty. Nonstatutory aggravating factors may be considered by the jury in selecting an appropriate sentence once a defendant is found eligible for the death penalty, but they are not, and cannot be, used to determine that eligibility, as the Supreme Court has explained: “Statutory aggravating circumstances play a constitutionally necessary function at the stage of legislative definition: they circumscribe the class of persons eligible for the death penalty. But the Constitution does not require the jury to ignore other possible aggravating factors in the process of selecting, from among that class, those defendants who will actually be sentenced to death.” Zant v. Stephens, 462 U.S. 862, 878 , 103 S.Ct. 2733 , 77 L.Ed.2d 235 (1983). Because they relate only to nonstatutory aggravating factors, the hearsay statements challenged by [defendant] are relevant only to the jury’s selection of an appropriate punishment from within an authorized range and not to the establishment of his eligibility for the death penalty. After reviewing the applicable caselaw and considering the particular importance”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Berget