Thomas v. Cox’s Empirical Analysis
708 F.2d 132 · 1983
Citation profile
17 federal appellate · 22 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 46 later decisions — most recently June 2023 · most notably Matteo v. Superintendent (1999), United States v. Love (1998)
17 federal appellate · 22 state decisions — followed in 12 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 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996)
Relies on Massiah v. United States · Brewer v. Williams · United States v. Henry · Local 408, International Brotherhood of Teamsters v. National Labor Relations Board · Sumner v. Mata
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 46 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“at no time subject to the control of the Commonwealth, had made no prior `arrangement' with the Commonwealth to procure information from or testify against the accused, and had `nothing to gain' from his actions vis-a-vis the accused, having been promised no reward, nor having any reason created by the Commonwealth to anticipate any.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“[F]or whatever reason [the informant] acted — whether “conscience,” as the state court found, or “curiosity,” as he testified, or even conceivably from an unencouraged hope to curry favor — he could not properly be characterized, as could the informant in Henry , as “a Government agent expressly commissioned to secure evidence.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. State v. Quattlebaum“The point at which agency — hence proper attribution — for this purpose arises out of a Government-citizen relationship is not subject to any bright-line test.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Schmitt v. True
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.