Mueller v. Technical Devices Corp.’s Empirical Analysis
1951
Citation profile
8 federal appellate · 16 district · 20 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 52 later decisions — most recently July 2014 · most notably Tessmar v. Grosner (1957), McAdam v. Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc. (1990)
8 federal appellate · 16 district · 20 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 Mueller v. Seaboard Commercial Corp. · Woodside v. Adams · Farrow v. Ocean County Trust Co. · Ward v. Huff · Frome v. Dennis
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 52 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The gist of an action in trover is conversion, that is, the exercise of any act of dominion in denial of another's title to the chattels or inconsistent with such title.”
4 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“The demand made by Mueller for possession of the property was made upon a person who had no authority to deliver the chattels. Saltz was merely a workman in charge of factory operations; he had no authority to let any property go out of the plant without the approval of the directors. A failure to surrender goods constitutes a conversion only if the demand is made upon a person obligated to surrender the goods, or if made upon an agent or employee such power must be within the scope of his agency or employment. With respect to a demand on a corporation, it must be made upon an officer or the governing body authorized to act thereon.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority““[t]o constitute a conversion of goods there must be some repudiation by the defendant of the owner’s right, or some exercise of dominion over them by him inconsistent with such right, or some act done which has the effect of destroying or changing the quality of the chattel.” ... “Less than this would constitute trespass, but not a conversion, so long as the character of the chattels remained unchanged.””
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.