Internet Legal Research for Professor Mika’s Legal Drafting Class Dec. 2, 2009

Outline Internet v. Lexis, Westlaw Forms Evaluating Web Sites Legal Portals and Search Engines Free Case Law/Primary Sources Current Awareness Internet Documents in Court

Internet v. Lexis/Westlaw Internet is Free. No charges to clients Some info exclusive to Internet Municipal Ordinances Some Court FilingsCourt Filings New case/regulation (within one day) New topics/issues

Internet v. Lexis/WL Benefits of Lexis, WL, others (Casemaker): Coverage. Internet, Ohio cases back to 1950, mid 90s for unreporteds Better Search Mechanisms Editorial features – headnotes, annotations Secondary sources – treatises, practice books Aggregate Info for one stop searching Trustworthiness

Forms Forms and Practice Materials Resource Guide Forms and Practice Materials Resource Guide

Forms and Sample Contracts Who publishes the site? A legal publisher? bar association? Does the site sell forms? Who wrote the form? Use with caution, tailor to your facts

Attorney Work Product Sites JDSupra - Documents are tied to attorney profilesJDSupra Scribd DocStoc LawLink Legal On-Ramp

TRY IT Look for a lease form on JD Supra Find information about the attorney who submitted the form

Transactional Documents via SEC EDGAR EDGAR sample SEC filings documents attached: management contracts, executive compensation plans, articles of incorporation, by-laws, material contracts, voting trust agreements See Item 601, Regulation S-K. Item 601, Regulation S-K.

SEC Edgar Full Text Search Features Fields for company name, SIC code, date, form type (but not exhibit type) Natural language or Boolean Phrase (“”), AND, OR, NOT, truncation (*, communicat* ), proximity operator (general NEAR1 motors ) Past 4 years

Try it Find an executive compensation plan which provides for a parking space

More sophisticated SEC Filing databases Lexis and Westlaw Mergentonline – Available via University Library, Cleveland Public Mergentonline SECInfo.com

Transactional Forms – Other Ideas Search engines – general or legal Court dockets Cleveland Law Library FAQs – ex. Living Wills Durable Power of AttorneyLiving Wills Durable Power of Attorney

Legal Drafting Advice Cleveland Marshall Law Library’s Research Guide: Forms and Practice MaterialsForms and Practice Materials AdamsDrafting Blog

Evaluating Web Sites Credibility: author; possible bias, accuracy. Currency / Updating, Coverage Writing Quality Ease of use – Design, navigation, searchability, help Stability

What’s on the Free Web All US Supreme Court Cases Reported Federal Appellate 1882-, Fed District Some Unreported Fed App, Fed District State cases: Reported cases from 1950-, unreported varies (1990s on) Statutes & Regulations- federal and states LOTS more!

Internet Portals Library Home Page – Legal Research on the Web Library Home Page Legal Research on the Web Public Records & People Finders Cornell Legal Information Institute (LII) FindLaw Other Portals

Use LEGAL Search Engines Cornell University Legal Research EngineCornell University Legal Research Engine LexisWeb FindLaw LawCrawler Justia List of Search Legal Engines

Search Engines Clustering search engines: Clusty, Ask.comClusty Ask.com Metasearch engines: Dogpile,ClustyDogpileClusty Internet Wayback Machine Learn search syntax of Google and a few other search engines, See Web Searching Guide - Search EnginesWeb Searching Guide - Search Engines

Web Sites to Know Thomas.gov – Federal Legislative History Thomas LexisONE – past 10 yrs cases, Lexis search capability LexisONE Google Scholar – best coverage of cases, decent search capability, law review articles Google Scholar GPO Access – Fed’l Govt. will be FDSys GPO AccessFDSys Martindale Hubbell Law Digest Ohio Supreme Court PACER – Federal Court dockets PACER

The Invisible Web Search Engines not index entire web Search engines cannot type or think. “Invisible Web” includes information stored in databases and password restricted information The Invisible or Deep Web by U.C. Berkeley The Invisible or Deep Web

Accessing Invisible Web Find databases via directories or search engines (search for a subject term and the word “database”), or ask a librarian. The Librarian’s Internet Index and Complete Planet. The Librarian’s Internet IndexComplete Planet Bookmark the databases you find See Web Searching GuideWeb Searching Guide Example – A person's traffic tickets. Try a search on Google, then try a search on pipl.com pipl.com

Case law Legal Research Workstation - Case Law Google Scholar – state reported 1950-, fed circuit/ district 1923-Google Scholar Ohio Supreme Court Public Library of Law – boolean searching, good coveragePublic Library of Law Open Jurist – fed reported appellate 1882-Open Jurist

Demo Ohio Supreme Court case search

Current Awareness Tools Blog Search Engines and Directories RSS Readers - What are they? Ex. BloglinesWhat are they? Bloglines Ohio Supreme Court cases – new opinions, case activity notificationnew opinionscase activity notification Current Awareness Resources for Ohio LawCurrent Awareness Resources for Ohio Law Watch That Page

Internet Documents in Court Law itself (statutes, case law, etc.), Internet versions are usually not the official version or an authenticated version. See blog post: Web Resources: Official or AuthenticWeb Resources: Official or Authentic Articles or other evidence, print off the web page to show date retrieved see 5 Weinstein's Federal Evidence, LexisNexis, Chapter 900, esp

Conclusion Use Free Web, but be aware of its limitations in coverage, currency, searching ability, reliability Go beyond Google: Use free legal databases, legal search engines and portals