State v. Smith’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 9 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 11 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “this Court, while not expressly adopting a precise definition, has noted the following factors to be considered in finding “depravity of mind”: mental state of defendant, infliction of physical or psychological torture upon the victim as when victim has a substantial period of time before death to anticipate and reflect upon it; brutality of defendant’s conduct; mutilation of the body after death; absence of any substantive motive; absence of defendant’s remorse and the nature of the crime.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Mathenia v. Delo

2. “factors which will be found to justify a finding of depravity of mind mean that the murder must involve serious physical abuse. For example, evidence that the murder victim or other victims at the murder scene were beaten or evidence that numerous wounds were inflicted upon a victim will support the aggravating circumstance. The”

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