Malloy v. Hogan

U.S. Case Law

378 U.S. 1 (1964), extended the Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination to criminal defendants in state courts. Previously “pleading the Fifth,” i.e., choosing to remain silent in the course of a criminal investigation or trial, was reserved only for federal defendants. In this case, involving a Connecticut gambler who was charged with contempt for refusing to identify the owner of a pool hall, the Court used the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to extend the provisions of the Fifth Amendment to the states, thus expanding the rights of all criminal defendants. Five years later in Benton v. Maryland, 395 U.S. 784 (1969), the Court used the same process to extend the guarantee against double jeopardy to state defendants.