State v. Stephens’s Empirical Analysis
1979
Citation profile
2 federal appellate · 60 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 64 later decisions — most recently June 2020 · most notably Swafford v. State (1991), State v. Barber (2004)
2 federal appellate · 60 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 Benton v. Maryland · Parker v. Gladden · Fanchon & Marco, Inc. v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. · State v. Roy · State v. Manus
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 64 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“In New Mexico the law on this point is well settled. It is highly improper for the trial court to have any communication with the jury except in open court and in the presence of the accused and his counsel. State v. Orona, 92 N.M. 450 , 589 P.2d 1041 (1979); State v. Beal, 48 N.M. 84 , 146 P.2d 175 (1944); State v. Brugger, 84 N.M. 135 , 500 P.2d 420 (Ct.App.1972). When such communication takes place, a presumption of prejudice arises. State v. Brugger, supra. Such a presumption of prejudice must have been intended to be guardian to the rights of confrontation and cross-examination, and therefore strong and compelling. The State has the burden of affirmatively showing that the defendant was not prejudiced by the communication between the court and the jury. State v. Orona, supra, State v. Beal, supra.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. State v. McCarter“Stephens argues that a sentence of life imprisonment on the felony murder charge and ten to fifty years on the armed robbery charge, to be served consecutively, punishes him twice for the same offense and violates the double jeopardy clause. We disagree. “Merger” is the name applied to the concept of multiple punishment when multiple charges are brought in a single trial. (Citations omitted.) The test of whether one criminal offense has merged in another is whether one offense “necessarily involves” the other. (Citations omitted.) In determining whether one offense “necessarily involves” another offense so that merger applies, courts have looked to the definitions of crimes to see whether the elements are the same. (Citations omitted.)”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. State v. Martinez“Further, the record fails to show substantial evidence to the effect that the communication did not affect the verdict. The burden of establishing this fact resting with the State, and the State failing to meet this burden, the presumption of prejudicial error must prevail.”
1 later decision quote this exact passagee.g. State v. McCarter
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.