Arnold Dresden v. Norman A. Willock’s Empirical Analysis
518 F.2d 281 · 1975
Citation profile
5 federal appellate · 2 district · 4 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 15 later decisions — most recently September 2011
5 federal appellate · 2 district · 4 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 Eleanor Erica Strong v. Francisco Gutierrez Repide · Helms v. Duckworth · Funk v. Spalding
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 15 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“There is no question that Dresden’s initial role in the project was that of a fiduciary: That Dresden may have held another position ... did not divest him of the fiduciary obligations incident to his role as an attorney. Dresden, functionally at least, was not only a stockholder in and an attorney for the corporation, but a director and officer as well____Moreover, as a result of his experience in law and business and [defendant’s] corporation inexperience, his was the responsible hand on the corporate tiller and that [defendant] so regarded him. His fiduciary obligation as an attorney, as an officer and director, and as a stockholder in a closely held corporation, required a higher standard of conduct. The change of positions ... directed that Dresden as a fiduciary give [defendant] a thorough explanation as a minimum requirement of fair dealing in these circumstances. The proper questions is whether a party to a contract who in a fiduciary capacity as an attorney, an officer, a director, and a minority stockholder in a closely held corporation, induced majority stockholder to execute it without fully and fairly disclosing ... Since the undisputed facts establish that Dresden, the plaintiff-fiduciary ... Dresden was more than a mere agent. As an officer and director, and a legal counsel, he occupied a fiduciary relationship of the highest order ... [Id at 284-90 (emphasis added).]”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“The fact that Dresden was to be paid by receiving stock in the enterprise did not change the nature of the (attorney-client) relationship”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.