United States v. Olvera’s Empirical Analysis
523 F.2d 1252 · 1975
Citation profile
26 federal appellate ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 31 later decisions — most recently January 1996 · most notably United States v. Onick (1989), United States v. Franklin (1984)
26 federal appellate ·
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 21 U.S.C. § 841 (§ 401 of the Controlled Substances Act)
Relies on Turner v. United States
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 31 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“First, there was evidence that the quantity of cocaine found was “very unusual” in the context of the prison setting and that prison authorities almost never found any narcotics in that quantity. Second, evidence of resale value of the drug may support an inference of intent to distribute. Here the evidence showed that procaine found with the cocaine could be used to dilute the latter so that it would be possible to make approximately 260 “bindles” of 15% pure cocaine that would sell for $10 each in the institution. From the evidence it would be reasonable for the jury to infer that the resale value of the cocaine was $2,600. The figure is significant and the jury could conclude that the cocaine was not possessed merely for “personal use.” Third, whether the defendant is addicted to the drug found in his possession is another consideration in determining whether there was sufficient evidence of intent to distribute. A finding of addiction may support an inference that a larger quantity of the drug may be kept for personal use. Here, however, the defendant testified that he was a heroin addict and that he did not like to use cocaine. The amount of the cocaine seized, in light of these, additional circumstances, provided relevant evidence from which the jury could properly find or infer, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the appellant possessed the cocaine with the intent to distribute it.”
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.