Wehling v. Columbia Broadcasting System’s Empirical Analysis
608 F.2d 1084 · 1979
Citation profile
47 federal appellate · 19 district · 48 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 181 later decisions — most recently March 2025 · most notably United States v. Parcels of Land (1990), Securities & Exchange Commission v. Colello (1998)
47 federal appellate · 19 district · 48 state decisions — followed in 22 states
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
Applies 18 U.S.C. § 3282
Relies on Simmons v. United States · Griffin v. California · Malloy v. Hogan · Hoffman v. United States · Maness v. Meyers
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 181 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“When plaintiff's silence is constitutionally guaranteed, dismissal is appropriate only where other, less burdensome, remedies would be an ineffective means of preventing unfairness to defendant.”
8 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“'The Supreme Court has disapproved of procedures which require a party to surrender one constitutional right in order to assert another.'”
7 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. Ex Parte Baugh · Ex Parte Dinkel“"The question here ... is ... what effect the assertion of this privilege would have on his libel action against CBS. Wehling argues that dismissing his lawsuit because he asserted his self-incrimination privilege in effect penalized him for exercising a fundamental constitutional right. He claims that the district court abused its discretion by making the invocation of the Fifth Amendment privilege `costly.' Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U.S. 1 , 84 S.Ct. 1489 , 12 L.Ed.2d 653 (1964). CBS, on the other hand, argues that the district court properly respected the rights of both parties when, though recognizing Wehling's right to assert the self-incrimination privilege, it remedied the resulting unfairness to CBS by dismissing the action. Furthermore, CBS contends that postponing discovery pending termination of the grand jury proceedings or expiration of the limitations period would prejudice its efforts to prepare a defense to Wehling's claim. "We do not dispute CBS's assertion that it would be unfair to permit Wehling to proceed with his lawsuit and, at the same time, deprive CBS of information needed to prepare its truth defense. The plaintiff who retreats under the cloak of the Fifth Amendment cannot hope to gain an unequal advantage against the party he has chosen to sue. To hold otherwise would, in terms of the customary metaphor, enable plaintiff to use his Fifth Amendment shield as a sword. This he cannot do. Wehling, however, has not claimed the right to proceed to trial witho”
4 later decisions 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.