State v. Weitbrecht’s Empirical Analysis
1999
Citation profile
205 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 207 later decisions — most recently February 2026 · most notably State v. Hairston (2008), 140 Ohio App. 3d 517 - State v. Petitjean (2000)
205 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 Solem v. Helm · Harmelin v. Michigan · Robinson v. State of California · Enmund v. Florida · Weems v. United States
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 207 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[e]xcessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”
23 later decisions quote this exact passage“First, we look to the gravity of the offense and the harshness of the penalty. * * * Second, it may be helpful to compare the sentences imposed on other criminals in the same jurisdiction. If more serious crimes are subject to the same penalty, or to less serious penalties, that is some indication that the punishment at issue may be excessive. * * * Third, courts may find it useful to compare the sentences imposed for commission of the same crime in other jurisdictions.”
5 later decisions quote this exact passage“'does not require strict proportionality between crime and sentence. Rather, it forbids only extreme sentences that are grossly disproportionate to the crime.'”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage
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.