Offen v. Brenner’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

2 federal appellate · 12 district · 13 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 33 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[I]n deciding whether a statement that led to an administrative proceeding against a public employee is protected by absolute privilege, should the duties and authority of the employee against whom the statement was made be considered in determining ‘the nature of the public function of the proceeding?’”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 553 F. Supp. 2d 565 - Offen v. Brenner · 334 F. App'x 578 - Offen v. Brenner

2. “whether absolute witness immunity will be extended to any administrative proceeding ... in large part turn[s] on two factors: (1) the nature of the public function of the proceeding and (2) the adequacy of procedural safeguards which will minimize the occurrence of defamatory statements .”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Day v. Johns Hopkins Health Sys. Corp. · Michael Day, Jr. v. Johns Hopkins Health System

3. “In the past several months I have had a number of telephone calls and E mail communications from Dr. Offen, each requesting my private opinion on DVIC cases not officially assigned to me for consultation.... The first of this latter type of call was regarding the makeup of our Civilian Expert Immunization Committee (CEIC). The substance of that call was to question me about the process of selection of committee members. I felt that the tone of the questioning was accusatory and, in my opinion, defamatory and degrading to DVIC.... You will recall that, several months ago, you arranged a telephone conference in which you, Dr. Arnold Gale and I participated. The purpose of that conference was to discuss the [Hepatitis B claim].... About 2 months ago Dr. Offen called me, stating that the case had not been presented in its entirety and that you had misrepresented the facts to induce Dr. Gale and me____My recollection of the call was that Dr. Offen accused you of twisting the facts and of leaving out pertinent information to suit some personal purpose and that he wanted to send me the case record suggesting that my review of the documents would prove that our conclusion was in error.... I have been very disturbed by the tone of Dr. Offen’s accusations and the way in which he has seemed to try to enlist my support in some sort of personal vendetta against DVIC in general and several members of the office in particular. Indeed I believe that Dr. Offen has had something derogatory to ”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 334 F. App'x 578 - Offen v. Brenner