Williams v. Brewer’s Empirical Analysis
509 F.2d 227 · 1975
Citation profile
11 federal appellate · 4 district · 15 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 38 later decisions (2 by the Supreme Court) — most recently November 2019 · most notably Nix v. Williams (1984), Brewer v. Williams (1977)
11 federal appellate · 4 district · 15 state decisions — followed in 11 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
Relationships
Relies on Miranda v. State of Arizona Vignera · Glasser v. United States · Schneckloth v. Bustamonte · Johnson v. Zerbst · Townsend v. Sain
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 38 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“an intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right or privilege,”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“saw two legs in it and they were skinny and white.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The two detectives, with Williams in their charge, then set out on the 160-mile drive. At no time during the trip did Williams express a willingness to be interrogated in the absence of an attorney. Instead, he stated several times that “[w]hen I get to Des Moines and see Mr. McKnight, I am going to tell you the whole story.” Detective Learning knew that Williams was a former mental patient, and knew also that he was deeply religious. The detective and his prisoner soon embarked on a wide-ranging conversation covering a variety of topics, including the subject of religion. Then, not long after leaving Davenport and reaching the interstate highway, Detective Learning delivered what has been referred to in the briefs and oral arguments as the “Christian burial speech.” Addressing Williams as “Reverend,” the detective said: “I want to give you something to think about while we’re traveling down the road.... Number one, I want you to observe the weather conditions, it’s raining, it’s sleeting, it’s freezing, driving is very treacherous, visibility is poor, it’s going to be dark early this evening. They are predicting several inches of snow for tonight, and I feel that you yourself are the only person that knows where this little girl’s body is, that you yourself have only been there once, and if you get a snow on top of it you yourself may be unable to find it. And, since we will be going right past the area on the way into Des Moines, I feel that we could stop and locate the bod”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Williams v. Nix
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.