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Westlaw

These are just a couple of things I think are helpful. If you have specific questions on any given one just let me know. I’ll do my best to explain them as clearly and in as much detail as possible.

1.Black’s Law Dictionary. It’s the definitive law dictionary. The best of the best. However, if you find yourself in a position where you need a free legal dictionary for a quick reference, you can use http://dictionary.law.com/

2.Find. Use this if you already have a case citation.

3.KeySearch. This is a topical search. I find it’s pretty helpful. I provided a few shots to give you am idea of some of the topics and subtopics it covers. It’s really extensive.

This is half of the main topics in KeySearch. In case you can’t make them out (sorry about that), they include Bankruptcy, Civil Rights, Health, Immigration, and Product Liability. Some of the others on the bottom half of the list are Family Law, Torts, Property (Personal and Real), Taxation, and Wills. Within all of these topics are several subtopics.

For example, this is a list of some of the subtopics under Torts/Personal Injury. Again, presuming you may have trouble reading the text above, some of them are Nuisance, False Imprisonment, Medical Malpractice, Assault and Battery, and Emotional Distress. Almost all of these subtopics have fold icons to their left indicating that they have additional, more specific subtopics. A magnifying glass indicates a searchable database. That about covers KeySearch.

4. Basic Search. This is typically my preferred where possible. I’ll explain why below. Essentially, you can type in all the terms you want to search in the text box. It will always return exactly one hundred results (while an Advanced Search can return more or less).

The reason I like Basic Search is because when you read a case, you can use the “Best” arrow, and it will direct you to the section most relevant to your search.

5. Advanced Search. It’s more complicated than a Basic Search, but it’s more precise. Also known as a “Boolean Search” or a “Terms and Connectors Search.” It’s on the technical side but it has its benefits. I filled in a sample search for comparative fault in a supermarket slip-and-fall case. The connector I used in the first search field, +S, requests documents in which the word “comparative” comes before the word “fault” in the same sentence. Additionally, as illustrated in the second search field, you can put quotes around a phrase to return exact matches of that phrase. This search method also offers a choice of specific date ranges as well as an option to exclude a specific term from your search. For example, if you want to search for cases related to comparative fault, but have no use for cases relating to product liability; you can choose to exclude that phrase.

Terms and ConnectorsConnector and Description

• &………………………………...And

• <space>…………………………..Or

• “ ”……………………………..Phrase

• %.............................................But Not

• !....................................Root Expander

• *……………………………Wildcard

• /s……….….…..In the Same Sentence

• +s………...Preceding within Sentence

• /p…………......In the Same Paragraph

• +p………Preceding within Paragraph

• /n………….……….Within n terms of

• +n………Preceding within n terms of

Example• Negligence & Accident

• Contributory Comparative

• “Comparative fault”

• Rain! (returns variations; i.e.: rained, raining, rainbow)

• F*ll (returns variations; i.e.: fall, fell, fill, full)

• Comparative /s fault (the two words occur in the same sentence)

• Comparative +s fault (“comparative” will occur before “fault)

• Negligence /p accident (the two words occur in the same paragraph)

• Negligence +p accident (“negligence” will occur before “accident”)

• Accident /5 vehicle (will return results in which the two terms occur within 5 words of each other

• Car +5 accident (will return results in which “car” appears within five words preceding “accident”

A few other helpful notes for when you’re reading a case or statute. For cases, specifically, I like to review West’s introductory summary to see if the case is something that might contain useful information It also helps to review the West Headnotes. The numbered links will take you to the section of the case that speaks to the specified headnote.

If you want to find other cases that have cited this case, you can use the “Citing References” link on the left hand side of the screen.

This is also helpful when reviewing statutes. It points you to cases that interpret the specific statute that you are researching.

West offers a tool called KeyCite which specifies the validity of a case or law. You don’t want present your supervising attorney with an argument based on a case that is no longer valid law because it’s been overruled. Although they are sort hard to make out (again, I’m sorry about that), these are the West KeyCite indicators. The green “C” indicates that the case or statute has many citing references available. The blue “H” indicates that the case or statute has a history.

The yellow flag indicates possible legislative changes or that the case has been cited somewhat negatively by other cases. A red flag, as one would imagine, is something to be paid attention to, either that the case or statute has been overruled or repealed, or there has been some sort of major legislative change. A good rule of thumb is to steer clear of items with a red flag until researching them extremely thoroughly.

6. American Jurisprudence 2d (AMJUR) is a legal encyclopedia, another helpful tool. If you find you need a free legal encyclopedia, there is one available through Cornell University Law School’s Legal Information Institute. It’s titled WEX and is available at http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/.

Some other helpful, and free, websites are FindLaw for Legal Professionals, http://lp.findlaw.com/ and the Public Library of Law, www.plol.org are both great sites for locating cases.

I hope this has been helpful. Feel free to e-mail me with any questions at swilhelm79@hotmail.com. I’m also available upon request on AIM, Google Talk, Facebook, and Skype.

Good luck!!