Wolfs v. Britton’s Empirical Analysis
509 F.2d 304 · 1975
Citation profile
26 federal appellate · 2 district · 11 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 56 later decisions — most recently June 2012 · most notably Washington v. Strickland (1982), Pickens v. Al Lockhart (1983)
26 federal appellate · 2 district · 11 state decisions
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 Townsend v. Sain · Powell v. State of Alabama Patterson · Chambers v. Maroney · Brown v. Allen · Picard v. Connor
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 56 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““[W]e cannot minimize the fact that effective assistance refers not only to forensic skills but to painstaking investigation in preparation for trial.””
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“has a substantial and very important role to perform in raising mitigating factors ... to the court at sentencing”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage“It is the duty of the lawyer to conduct a prompt investigation of the circumstances of the case and explore all avenues leading to facts relevant to guilt and degree of guilt or penalty. The investigation should always include efforts to secure information in the possession of the prosecution and law enforcement authorities. The duty to investigate exists regardless of the accused’s admissions or statements to the lawyer of facts constituting guilt or his stated desire to plead guilty.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Eldridge v. Atkins
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.