18 U.S.C. § 1346
Section 1346 · Definition of scheme or artifice to defraud
Amended 1 time on record
Applied in 537 court decisions — leading case West Virginia University Hospitals, Inc. v. Casey (1991)
Most recently applied in United States v. Lopez (July 2025)
Applied most in the Third Circuit Circuit (34 decisions)
Cases citing this section usually also cite 18 U.S.C. § 1341 · 18 U.S.C. § 1343 · 18 U.S.C. § 371
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
For the purposes of this chapter, the term “scheme or artifice to defraud” includes a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services.