United States v. Brown’s Empirical Analysis
562 F.2d 1144 · 1977
Citation profile
65 federal appellate · 2 district · 7 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 85 later decisions — most recently July 2025 · most notably United States v. Mehrmanesh (1982), United States v. Shaw (1983)
65 federal appellate · 2 district · 7 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
Applies 21 U.S.C. § 841 (§ 401 of the Controlled Substances Act) · 5 U.S.C. § 552 (Freedom of Information Act) · 5 U.S.C. § 552A (§ 3 of the Privacy Act of 1974)
Relies on Brady v. State of Maryland · United States v. Agurs · Giglio v. United States · Davis v. Alaska · Roviaro 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 85 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“It necessarily follows that if the omitted evidence creates a reasonable doubt that did not otherwise exist, constitutional error has been committed. This means that the omission must be evaluated in the context of the entire record. If there is no reasonable doubt about guilt, whether or not the additional evidence is considered, there is no justification for a new trial. On the other hand, if the verdict is already of questionable validity, additional evidence of relatively minor importance might be sufficient to create a reasonable doubt.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[W]hen one codefendant objects ... further objections by other defendants are unnecessary.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“negligently failed to discover and utilize information in their own possession.”
3 later decisions 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.