Fields v. State’s Empirical Analysis
1996
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 10 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 14 later decisions — most recently August 2025
2 federal appellate · 10 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 Strickland v. Washington · Jackson v. Denno · Soberon v. United States · Needler v. Valley National Bank of Arizona · Mahan & Rowsey, Inc. v. Oklahoma Natural Gas
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 14 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“We find nothing in the record to indicate [Fields] and defense counsel were not fully aware that the death penalty was a possibility upon entering a plea. . . . The record reveals no promises of leniency, threats or coercion as the catalyst for [Fields's] entry of a blind plea . . . .”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Fields v. Gibson“Likewise, there is nothing in the record supporting defense counsels' claims that they thought they 'had a wink and a nod' from the judge indicating [Fields] would not receive the death penalty if he entered a plea.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Fields v. Gibson“left the scene of the murder, sold the victim's gun to an upstairs neighbor, and purchased additional drugs with that money before returning to his girlfriend's house, all within a short period of time.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Fields v. Gibson
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.