Spears v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

12 federal appellate · 37 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 56 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Allegations of prosecutorial misconduct will not cause a reversal of judgment or modification of sentence unless their cumulative effect is such as to deprive the defendant of a fair trial and fair sentencing proceeding.”

   4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Howell v. State · Jones v. State

2. “[c]onscious[ness] . . . is the critical inquiry in determining whether a murder was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Dorsie Leslie Jones Jr v. Gary Gibson Attorney General of the State of Oklahoma · Spears v. Mullin

3. “None of the stab wounds focused on in the photographs can be considered probative of the question of conscious physical suffering, the only injuries arguably being relevant to such a determination being those from the beating. While the jury was not instructed that it had to find “conscious physical suffering,” it was instructed it had to find the victim’s death was preceded by torture or serious physical abuse.... Because none of the stab wounds occurred while the victim was conscious or preceded his death, such injuries cannot be considered relevant to the question before the jury.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Spears v. Mullin · 415 F. Supp. 2d 1268 - Brown v. Sirmons