United States v. McRae’s Empirical Analysis
593 F.2d 700 · 1979
Citation profile
170 federal appellate · 1 district · 30 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 238 later decisions — most recently December 2025 · most notably United States v. Thevis (1982), United States v. Bonds (1993)
170 federal appellate · 1 district · 30 state decisions — followed in 13 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.
Relationships
Applies 18 U.S.C. § 1111 · 18 U.S.C. § 1112
Relies on Linkletter v. Walker · Stevens v. Marks · United States v. Sealy, Inc. · United States v. Morris
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 238 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Relevant evidence is inherently prejudicial; but it is only unfair prejudice, substantially outweighing probative value, which permits exclusion of relevant matter under Rule 403. Unless trials are to be conducted on scenarios, on unreal facts tailored and sanitized for the occasion, the application of Rule 403 must be cautious and sparing. Its major function is limited to excluding matter of scant or cumulative probative force, dragged in by the heels for the sake of its prejudicial effect. As to such, Rule 403 is meant to relax the iron rule of relevance, to permit the trial judge to preserve the fairness of the proceedings by exclusion despite its relevance. It is not designed to permit the court to “even out” the weight of the evidence, to mitigate a crime, or to make a contest where there is little or none.”
41 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“(a) Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought. Every murder perpetrated by poison, lying in wait, or any other kind of willful, deliberate, malicious, and premeditated killing; or committed in the perpetration of, or attempt to perpetrate, any arson, escape, murder, kidnapping, treason, espionage, sabotage, aggravated sexual abuse or sexual abuse, burglary, or robbery; or perpetrated from a premeditated design unlawfully and maliciously to effect the death of any human being other than him who is killed, is murder in the first degree. Any other murder is murder in the second degree.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“And remembering that credibility, ladies and gentleman, remember that you don’t have to believe a word of what [the defendant] told you if you don’t want to.... Or if you want to, you can believe all of it and turn him loose, and we’ll send him down in the elevator with you with his gun. He’ll go out the front door with you.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. State v. Elledge · Lopez v. State
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.