Johnson v. Thigpen’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

8 federal appellate · 2 state decisions

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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “(a) The capital offense was committed by a person under sentence of imprisonment. (b) The defendant was previously convicted of another capital offense or of a felony involving the use or threat cf. violence to the person. (c) The defendant knowingly created a great risk of death to many persons. (d) The capital offense was committed while the defendant was engaged, or was an accomplice, in the commission of, or an attempt to commit, or flight after committing or attempting to commit, any robbery, rape, arson, burglary, kidnapping, aircraft piracy, sexual battery, unnatural intercourse with any child under the age of twelve (12), or noncon-sensual unnatural intercourse with mankind, or felonious abuse and/or battery of a child in violation of subsection (2) of section 97-5-39, or the unlawful use or detonation of a bomb or explosive device. (e) The capital offense was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or effecting an escape from custody. (f) The capital offense was committed for pecuniary gain. (g) The capital offense was committed to disrupt or hinder the lawful exercise of any governmental function or the enforcement of laws. (h) The capital offense was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. Johnson v. Thigpen

2. “[U]nder Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U.S. 420 , 100 S.Ct. 1759 , 64 L.Ed.2d 398 (1980), the construction of an aggravating circumstance may not be so broad that it encompasses an impermissibly large group of murderers so that it may be said that the sentence was the result of the standardless discretion of a basically uninstructed jury. As given a limited judicial, construction by the Mississippi Supreme Court, the terms “especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel” are not so vague and overbroad on their face as to violate the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments under Godfrey and Gray [v. Lucas, 677 F.2d 1086 ] standards. The Mississippi Supreme Court continues to define such aggravating circumstances as those which are “accompanied by such additional facts as to set the crime apart from the normal capital felonies — the conscienceless or pitiless crime which is unnecessarily tortuous to the victim, Billiot v. State, 454 So.2d 445, 464 (Miss.1984), quoting Coleman v. State, 378 So.2d 640, 648 (Miss.1979). See also Jordan v. State, 464 So.2d 475, 478 (Miss.1985); Spinkellink v. Wainwright, 578 F.2d 582 (5th Cir.1978).”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. 667 F. Supp. 314 - Hill v. Thigpen

3. “Every person who shall unnecessarily kill another, either while resisting an attempt by such other person to commit any felony, or to do any unlawful act, or after such attempt shall have failed, shall be guilty of manslaughter.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the dissent
   e.g. Johnson v. Thigpen