18 U.S.C. § 873
Section 873 · Blackmail
Amended 2 times on record
Applied in 25 court decisions — leading case United States v. Coyle (1995)
Most recently applied in United States v. Robert Defreitas (March 2022)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Whoever, under a threat of informing, or as a consideration for not informing, against any violation of any law of the United States, demands or receives any money or other valuable thing, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Historical and Revision Notes
Based upon title 18, U.S.C., 1940 ed., §250 (Mar. 4, 1909, ch. 321, §145, 35 Stat. 1114).
Only minor changes were made in phraseology.
Amendments
1994—Pub. L. 103–322 substituted “fined under this title” for “fined not more than $2,000”.