A benefit of having access to the internet is you have access to (almost) every kind of information in the world at your fingertips. Case law happens to be one source of information that you can find at home for free! Even though you can find case law from home, it only provides a good starting point for your research and does not take the place of commercial print and electronic resources like West and Lexis. In order to properly Shepardize (i.e.,see if the case is still good law), you will still need to come into your public law library to further your research. However, free online sources provide excellent time and money saving solutions to track down cases of interest from the comfort of your house.

Google Scholar is a great resource where you can easily search through cases from federal and state jurisdictions. Just make sure you check the “case law” box, click “select courts” to limit your search to a specific jurisdiction (if need be) and search away.

FindLaw While this resource is more tailored for the legal professional, anyone can use it. While searching for case law, you can enhance your search by filtering by legal topic (e.g., civil rights, family law, product liability, etc.) and by industry (e.g., autos, food and beverage, retail, etc.) as well as court jurisdiction.

Justia This resource features case law from the U.S. and state supreme courts as well as the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. District Courts. Simply select the jurisdiction and year you want to search and begin researching. (sidenote: knowledge of the geographic boundaries of the U.S. Court of Appeals and the U.S. District Courts for California and other states are preferred when using Justia. Info on those can be found here: U.S. Appeals U.S. District Courts 

The Public Library of Law is another exceptional resource where you can search through cases from the U.S. Supreme Court and Courts of Appeals and cases from all 50 states dating back to 1997. The Public Library of Law includes a video tutorial on their site that details how to use search through cases. You can also click on “What’s the best way to find a particular case?” link to see an example of a case citation, party names, and docket number. (sidenote: The Public Library of Law is powered by the same people who power Fastcase, which is a legal database that you can access remotely through RCLL. 

You don’t have to wait to come into the library to start searching for case law. You can start searching at home, and contact the library to learn how to access Fastcase, Westlaw and Lexis from home!

Written by: Michael Van Aken, Library Assistant