Welcome v. Blackburn’s Empirical Analysis
793 F.2d 672 · 1986
Citation profile
16 federal appellate · 2 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 25 later decisions — most recently May 2009 · most notably United States v. Forbes (1987), Cartwright v. Maynard (1987)
16 federal appellate · 2 state decisions
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
Relies on Gregg v. Georgia · Witherspoon v. Illinois · Woodson v. North Carolina · Duren v. Missouri · Zant v. Stephens
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 25 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“Louisiana’s inclusion as an element of the crime of first degree murder of the aggravating circumstance of committing multiple murders in a single consecutive course of conduct serves to cull out of the class of all murders, a small group which the State makes eligible for the death penalty. But finding that circumstance present in the course of determining guilt does not fix punishment. It only serves to permissibly advance the sentencing jury to the stage of weighing mitigating as well as aggravating circumstances in order to make an individualized determination of life or death based on the character of the individual and the circumstances of the crime. Zant v. Stephens, 462 U.S. 862 [, 103 S.Ct. 2733 , 77 L.Ed.2d 235 ] (1983). The finding of this aggravating circumstance as a part of the guilt determination process does not finally control the imposition of the death penalty. Such a finding only permits the death penalty to be considered. Furthermore, we note that the Louisiana Supreme Court has held that a jury is not compelled to find ¡¡m aggravating circumstance was present merely because it found the accused guilty of murder, State v. Knighton, 436 So.2d 1141 (La.1983), ce rt. denied, 465 U.S. 1051 [, 104 S.Ct. 1330 , 79 L.Ed.2d 725 ] (1984). In short, Louisiana does not enforce the sort of mandatory death penalty statute condemned in Woodson v. North Carolina, 428 U.S. 280 , 96 S.Ct. 2978 , 49 L.Ed.2d 944 (1976).”
1 later decision quote this exact passage“By classifying first degree murder as including certain aggravating circumstances the state has narrowed the class of those subject to the death penalty as effectively as if it allowed a broader class to be convicted but then limited those within the broader class who could be sentenced to death to only persons whose crimes are accompanied by specific aggravating circumstances.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Johnson v. Thigpen“There is such unfairness only if the prosecutor's remarks evince 'either persistent and pronounced misconduct or ... the evidence was so insubstantial that (in probability) but for the remarks no conviction would have occurred'”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. Rogers v. Lynaugh
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.