Elmore v. Ozmint’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

10 federal appellate · 1 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 28 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[W]e conclude that Elmore is entitled to habeas corpus relief____ Simply put, the gross failure of Elmore’s 1984 trial lawyers to investigate the State’s forensic evidence — including the medical examiner’s time-of-death opinion, the pubic hairs allegedly recovered from Mrs. Edwards's bed, the nature of the “Item T” materials removed from Mrs. Edwards’s bloody abdomen, and the fingerprint lifted from the blood-smeared toilet in Mrs. Edwards’s en suite bathroom — had a palpably adverse effect on the defense. The defense team ... admitted to being lulled into inaction by the belief that the police were above reproach. At most, the defense team gave fleeting thought to hiring experts to examine the evidence. Anderson blamed scarce state resources, but his testimony indicated that he and Beasley never isolated evidence deserving further examination, identified appropriate experts and ascertained their fees, or inquired about state and other possible sources of funding. Of course, it is now clear ... that an investigation into the State’s evidence would have exposed a multitude of questions about its legitimacy and reliability.... To be sure, it was thus an unreasonable application of [law] to rule that the failure of Elmore’s lawyers to investigate the State’s forensic evidence was justified by their faith in the integrity and infallibility of the police....”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 232 W. Va. 196 - David Ballard v. Brian Bush Ferguson

2. “In April 1985, Lori Engleson was interviewed by the [police]. She reported that she overheard Mary Jo Payne say she knew who killed the people in Forest City---- The defense counsel for Origer relied extensively on the investigations conducted by the [police]. Although the Lori Engleson statement was available to defense counsel before trial, defense counsel never conducted any independent investigations into the substance and validity of her allegations. Again, defense counsel has a duty to make reasonable investigations or to make a reasonable decision that makes particular investigations unnecessary. We agree with the findings of the district court that, had defense counsel followed up on the Engleson statement, defense counsel would have obtained the information set forth in the testimony of Mary Jo and Billy Payne. [18] Such testimony would have been consistent with Origer’s alibi defense and alibi testimony. We find the failure to investigate in this regard creates a reasonable probability that, if there had been a more thorough investigation of the statements made by these persons in Iowa Falls, the result of the proceeding would have been different.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 232 W. Va. 196 - David Ballard v. Brian Bush Ferguson

3. “A healthy skepticism of authority, while generally advisable, is an absolute necessity for a lawyer representing a client charged with capital murder. After all, the custodians of authority in our democracy are ordinary people with imperfect skills and human motivations. The duty of the defense lawyer “is to make the adversarial testing process work in the particular case,” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690 , 104 S.Ct. 2052 — an obligation that cannot be shirked because of the lawyer’s unquestioning confidence in the prosecution.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the concurrence
   e.g. Hash v. Johnson