Withers v. Eveland’s Empirical Analysis
1997
Citation profile
2 district ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 18 later decisions — most recently May 2017
2 district ·
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 15 U.S.C. § 1692 (Fair Debt Collection Practices Act) · 15 U.S.C. § 1692E (Fair Debt Collection Practices Act) · 15 U.S.C. § 1692G (Fair Debt Collection Practices Act) · 15 U.S.C. § 1692K (Sherman Antitrust Act)
Relies on Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. · Celotex Corporation v. Catrett H · Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. v. Zenith Radio Corporation · Clomon v. Jackson · Jeter v. Credit Bureau, Inc.
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 18 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“[T]he collection letter instructed [the consumer] to either “contact” the debt collection agency or make payment in full. There is no indication anywhere in the letter whether such “contact” must be in writing or by telephone. Pursuant to § 1692g, however, if a consumer contests a debt by telephone rather than in writing, the consumer will inadvertently lose the protections for debtors set forth in the FDCPA; the debt collection agency would be under no obligation to verify the debt and cease all collection efforts as required by § 1692g(b). Given such contradictory and ambiguous language, an unsophisticated debtor could be easily confused about the response, time and forego the protections afforded by the statute. On these facts, the Court will find that the collection letter sent by [defendant] failed to effectively convey the validation notice to Withers.”
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.