Vanderbilt v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 148 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 153 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““In this case we conclude that the ‘minds of an average jury’ would not have found the State’s case less persuasive had the testimony ... been excluded. The admission into evidence of these statements, therefore, was at most harmless error.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Bird v. State · Lewis v. State

2. “Officer A.L. Morris, of the Amarillo Police Department, testified that he and fellow officers searched for the bullet on April 17. The search lasted approximately four hours and was unsuccessful. An area in the shape of a semi-circle with a radius three hundred feet from the body was then staked off and systematically searched with the aid of metal detectors. The bullet was recovered within the staked-off area after a three-hour search on April 18. The bullet was found by Officer James Smith of the Amarillo Police Department. Smith related that while sitting on the ground within the staked-off area, he observed the bullet lying on top of the ground. The bullet was two hundred and forty-eight feet from the victim’s body in a northwesterly direction. Smith testified that he and fellow officers had conducted an experiment based upon statements made by appellant in an oral confession. The experiment was conducted in an effort to determine the location of the bullet at the scene of the offense. Independent of appellant’s statement, Smith knew the location of the victim’s body, the direction the victim’s head was pointed at the time the body was found, the location of the entry and exit gunshot wounds to the victim’s head, the victim’s height and appellant’s height. Further, it was shown that Smith knew the gunshot wound had dislodged an earring from the victim’s ear and that he was aware of the direction from the victim in which the earring was found. With regard to the assistance”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 683 F. Supp. 1118 - Vanderbilt v. Lynaugh

3. “As pointed out by former Presiding Judge Onion in an earlier work, this Court has never held that Article 38.23 ... absolutely prevents the application of the several exceptions to the application of the exclusionary rule that have evolved over the years. In Vanderbilt \supra ], this Court noted that the “[t]hree commonly advanced exceptions to the exclusionary rule include the ‘independent source,’ ‘inevitable discovery,’ and ‘attenuation’ doctrines.” With respect to the doctrine of inevitable discovery, the United States Supreme Court adopted and explained the inevitable discovery concept in Nix [supra ]: “If the prosecution can establish by a preponderance of the evidence that the information ultimately or inevitably would have been discovered by lawful means ... then the deterrence rationale has so little basis that the evidence should be received.” [Citations omitted]. This court has previously applied the principle of inevitable discovery to testimony of witnesses whose discovery was imminent absent illegal state action. See Vanderbilt, supra at 722 ; Wicker [supra ] (Victim’s body would have been recovered regardless of the information furnished by defendant’s second oral statement); Dickey [supra ] (“Where evidence is obtained after a defendant’s constitutional rights have been violated, if the prosecution can establish information by a preponderance of the evidence that the information ultimately or inevitably would have been discovered by lawful means, then the dete”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Garcia v. State