1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,866 Welcome to a short video tutorial on using citators to validate your cases 2 00:00:05,866 --> 00:00:12,199 and make sure they are still good law and to find additional cases for your research. 3 00:00:12,200 --> 00:00:17,766 My name is Susan Boland and I am the Associate Director at the Marx Law Library. 4 00:00:17,766 --> 00:00:20,399 I will be narrating the video today. 5 00:00:20,400 --> 00:00:26,300 When researching, one of the most important steps in the research process is to 6 00:00:26,300 --> 00:00:30,866 Shepardize and Keycite your cases to make sure they are still good law. 7 00:00:30,866 --> 00:00:35,332 You can also use Shepards and KeyCite to find additional cases. 8 00:00:35,333 --> 00:00:41,966 There are generally two primary things you are looking for when doing citator research with cases. 9 00:00:41,966 --> 00:00:47,632 You want to find any history citations and any treatment analysis. 10 00:00:47,633 --> 00:00:54,466 The history citations will cover a case related to yours or the same case at a different stage of litigation. 11 00:00:54,466 --> 00:01:00,832 This is where you can determine if a higher court has reversed, modified, or vacated a decision. 12 00:01:00,833 --> 00:01:06,799 The treatment analysis will cover how other cases have evaluated your case. 13 00:01:06,800 --> 00:01:14,666 This is where you can determine if a higher court has overruled your case or if other courts have questioned, distinguished 14 00:01:14,666 --> 00:01:17,666 or followed your case. 15 00:01:17,666 --> 00:01:24,699 A neutral analysis would be where an unrelated case has cited your case but not in an evaluative way. 16 00:01:24,700 --> 00:01:32,266 Examples of neutral analysis would be if a dissenting opinion cites your case or if a decision explains your case. 17 00:01:32,266 --> 00:01:38,932 When you pull up a case on Lexis or Westlaw, you will see a symbol attached to the case. 18 00:01:38,933 --> 00:01:43,133 These symbols are visual ways to see if your case is still good law. 19 00:01:43,133 --> 00:01:48,499 They will help you determine if there is a potential issue with a case you might want to use 20 00:01:48,500 --> 00:01:52,266 and might help you determine a case's authoritative value. 21 00:01:52,266 --> 00:01:57,066 There are differences between the citator symbols used by Lexis and Westlaw, 22 00:01:57,066 --> 00:02:03,432 but as a general rule, in either Lexis and Westlaw cases with a red flag or red stop sign 23 00:02:03,433 --> 00:02:08,933 may no longer be good law and should not be relied upon without doing further research. 24 00:02:08,933 --> 00:02:13,933 Similarly, cases with a yellow flag or yellow triangle should be used with caution. 25 00:02:13,933 --> 00:02:18,599 Remember, that you need to take into account the jurisdiction of your case 26 00:02:18,600 --> 00:02:24,100 and the cases citing your case in order to determine if your case is still good law. 27 00:02:24,100 --> 00:02:26,966 Let's take a look at these symbols 28 00:02:26,966 --> 00:02:32,599 Cases in Westlaw with a red flag symbol may no longer be good law 29 00:02:32,600 --> 00:02:36,100 and should not be relied upon without doing further research. 30 00:02:36,100 --> 00:02:41,433 Westlaw Edge has a new KeyCite symbol to warn of a risk of overruling. 31 00:02:41,433 --> 00:02:47,233 This is an orange circle with a white triangle inside of it that has an orange exclamation point within the triangle. 32 00:02:47,233 --> 00:02:54,066 The idea behind this signal is that a point of law in the case may have been undermined 33 00:02:54,066 --> 00:02:58,099 based on its reliance on an overruled or invalid prior decision. 34 00:02:58,100 --> 00:03:03,566 Note that this signal does not necessarily mean that the case is no longer good law. 35 00:03:03,566 --> 00:03:10,066 What it means is that you need to explore further to find out what risk, if any, exists. 36 00:03:10,066 --> 00:03:17,799 A yellow flag symbol means there is some negative history, often a case has been distinguished on the basis of different facts. 37 00:03:17,800 --> 00:03:22,566 A blue-striped flag indicates that a case is on appeal. 38 00:03:22,566 --> 00:03:25,699 This symbol is only available for federal cases. 39 00:03:25,700 --> 00:03:33,133 Remember, you will need to take into account the jurisdiction of your case and the cases citing your case in order to determine 40 00:03:33,133 --> 00:03:35,466 if your case is still good law. 41 00:03:35,466 --> 00:03:41,399 When using KeyCite, be sure and check both the History and the Citing References tab. 42 00:03:41,400 --> 00:03:48,466 For example, here in our Tinker v. Des Moines case, we see there is a yellow flag. 43 00:03:48,466 --> 00:03:56,366 When we first check out the history tab, we see there is no subsequent history after our case, only prior history. 44 00:03:56,366 --> 00:04:04,032 Next, when we check out the citing references tab, we see that out of the over 2,000 cases citing Tinker, 45 00:04:04,033 --> 00:04:08,199 164 of them gave it some sort of negative treatment. 46 00:04:08,200 --> 00:04:14,366 This includes the US Supreme Court case, Morse v. Fredrick which declined to extend the Tinker analysis as absolute 47 00:04:14,366 --> 00:04:17,666 and distinguished it on the basis of different facts. 48 00:04:17,666 --> 00:04:24,099 When using KeyCite to do further research, pay close attention to the Depth of Treatment bars. 49 00:04:24,100 --> 00:04:28,900 These indicate how much discussion of your case takes place in the citing case. 50 00:04:28,900 --> 00:04:31,366 The more bars, the more discussion. 51 00:04:31,366 --> 00:04:34,066 Four bars indicates an extended discussion, 52 00:04:34,066 --> 00:04:36,332 three bars a substantial discussion, 53 00:04:36,333 --> 00:04:38,299 two bars some discussion, 54 00:04:38,300 --> 00:04:41,166 and one bar is a brief rererence. 55 00:04:41,166 --> 00:04:45,532 When using KeyCite to find more cases and documents for further research, 56 00:04:45,533 --> 00:04:48,633 you can also limit or browse by headnote. 57 00:04:48,633 --> 00:04:52,266 You can limit by headnote by using the filters on the left. 58 00:04:52,266 --> 00:04:57,566 You can browse to see which cases cite your case for the issue discussed in a certain headnote number 59 00:04:57,566 --> 00:05:01,766 by using the far right column, the one next to the depth of treatment. 60 00:05:01,766 --> 00:05:07,299 You can also limit by other things such as court and jurisdiction. 61 00:05:07,300 --> 00:05:13,733 Cases in Lexis with a red octagon symbol indicates severe negative treatment. 62 00:05:13,733 --> 00:05:19,233 It may no longer be good law and should not be relied upon without doing further research. 63 00:05:19,233 --> 00:05:26,433 An orange square with a Q in it means the case has been questioned and the continuing validity or precedential value of the 64 00:05:26,433 --> 00:05:28,099 case may be in question. 65 00:05:28,100 --> 00:05:35,666 A yellow triangle symbol means there is some negative treatment, often a case has been distinguished on the basis of different facts. 66 00:05:35,666 --> 00:05:41,332 A green diamond with a plus sign in it indicates the case cited yours in a positive way, 67 00:05:41,333 --> 00:05:44,833 for example it followed or affirmed your case. 68 00:05:44,833 --> 00:05:51,433 A blue octagon with an A in it indicates that the citing references provide a neutral analysis of your case, 69 00:05:51,433 --> 00:05:53,733 for example explaining it. 70 00:05:53,733 --> 00:06:01,399 A blue octagon with an I in it indicates that the citing references exist but there is no analysis or treatment. 71 00:06:01,400 --> 00:06:04,166 An example would be a string citation. 72 00:06:04,166 --> 00:06:09,766 Like KeyCite, Shepards also uses bars to indicate depth of treatment. 73 00:06:09,766 --> 00:06:14,766 Again, the more bars, the more in depth the case discusses yours. 74 00:06:14,766 --> 00:06:18,332 Four bars indicates the case analyzes your case, 75 00:06:18,333 --> 00:06:20,666 three bars indicates it is discussed, 76 00:06:20,666 --> 00:06:22,966 two bars indicates it was mentioned, 77 00:06:22,966 --> 00:06:26,066 and one bar indicates the case was just cited. 78 00:06:26,066 --> 00:06:30,732 Also, like KeyCite, you can limit your Shepard’s results by headnote. 79 00:06:30,733 --> 00:06:38,699 We saw how we could do this within the headnotes of a case but we can also do it within Shepards by using the filters on the left. 80 00:06:38,700 --> 00:06:43,166 This concludes our video on cases and citators. 81 00:06:43,166 --> 00:06:48,732 If you have any questions about material that we covered in this or any of our other videos, 82 00:06:48,733 --> 00:06:53,066 please don’t hesitate to ask a librarian.