CMLawLibraryBlog

Audio Case Files and Courtroom Connect

AudioCaseFiles offers audio opinions of more than 1,000 cases. Download MP3s of your assigned cases and listen on the go. Cases are listed by subject or casebook.

Courtroom Connect allows you to view actual court cases. These cases are arranged by subject, name of parties, and jurisdiction. There are over 4,000 hours of cases available for your viewing.

To sign up for an account, go to the Audio Case Files site. Click on Sign up and register using your law school email.

Congratulations to Daniel Bollinger and Erin Eurenius! You correctly completed the entire 1L Law Library Orientation Quiz, and have each won the Civil Procedure, Contracts, Criminal Law, and Torts Nutshell study guides. Thanks to all 45 1L students who took the Quiz, and please stop by the Law Library Information Services desk to pick up a little gift as our additional thanks to you. Quiz answers are now available on the Orientation Research Quiz TWEN page.

All C-M students, look for more research questions and prize opportunities from the Law Library this semester.

1. Advanced Advocates- You can share case briefs; engage in discussions about cases; share outlines, which are peer-rated; and submit and read feedback about summer clerking jobs.

2. CaseMakerX - You can network with attorneys, professors and students; obtain free access to Casemaker databases and Casemaker Medical; and see job postings. Casemaker is a popular low-cost alternative to the Lexis and Westlaw legal research systems. See our prior posts: New Product: Casemaker Medical; Casemaker Electronic Research Databases Available

Perhaps you’ve heard of the Twinkie Defense, which has been used to characterize the argument made by defense attorneys in the 1979 Harvey Milk murder case that defendant Dan White operated under diminished capacity caused in part by his junk food diet. (or so the story goes – read Snopes.com for the background). Now comes the Seinfeld Defense. The DeMoines Register today reports astory of a Cedar Falls, Iowa man who claimed he was fired for sexual harassment for repeating the punch line to a gag from the Seinfeld show. Despite his protest that his firing was unlawful because he was merely referencing a line from the TV show, he was denied unemployment benefits. The article reports another case in Iowa denying benefits in 2004 to a man who also claimed that his repetition of a Seinfeld joke did not amount to sexual harassment, and a third Wisconsin 1992 case with a similar theme.

So, the Seinfeld defense hasn’t been too successful. To keep on top of developments in the law of sexual harassment in the workplace and other labor law issues, make sure to become familiar with the BNA Labor Relations Reporter/Labor and Employment Law Library , a comprehensive database of federal and state labor laws, court decisions, news, analysis, and practice guides with multiple search options and customization features. Sign up for BNA Current Awareness Services from the Labor and Employment Library to get email notification of the latest cases and news.

FYI - Justification for Torture or World Court Indictment Text...You be the Judge.

From The Washington Independent comes the 122 page, largely redacted report of the CIA Inspector General.From the National Security Archive, a side by side comparison of the Bush Administrations redaction and the Obama Administration redaction.

The library's new Study Aids Guide lists popular study aids for almost every College of Law subject, both books and CDs. The guide describes the different types of study aids, so you can decide what will be best for you. There is also instruction on how to easily find study aids in addition to the ones listed in the guide.

All 1Ls who have completed the Library’s orientation sessions are eligible to enter a drawing to win four nutshells – Torts, Contracts, Criminal Law & Civil Procedure. To enter the drawing, complete a brief quiz based on the information from the Library’s orientation session. 1Ls can sign up for the quiz on TWEN (from Westlaw).

The deadline to complete the quiz is Wednesday, August 26^th. Quiz answers will be posted and the winner of the four nutshells will be announced on Thursday, August 27, 2009. Good luck!!

This fall’s Mindset List from Beloit College is now out – giving college faculty a sense of the frame of reference of incoming freshmen. Here’s the new List for the Class of 2013. Or, select from the site to earlier years – such as for the Class of 2009, relating to many in our incoming Law class who have come directly from college.

With over 80 research guides at your disposal, the C-M Law Library is one of the best places to start your research on any legal topic from Administrative Law to War Crimes. If you know exactly what area of law you’re looking for, say Ohio evidence law, then go right on ahead to our tailored guide on the topic, Ohio Evidence Resource Guide. But if you don’t know exactly where to start, or which of our guides to use to find information on your research topic, you can turn to our new custom C-M Law Research Guide Search Engine for help. This custom search engine allows you to search all of our 80+ guides at one time for specific sources, authors, websites or any keyword or topic.

Recap is a free Firefox extension which:

• Automatically uploads federal court documents you pull from PACER to a free public archive (PACER charges 8 cents a page to view documents, which can add up.)
• When you are on PACER, identifies which documents in a particular docket are contained in the free archive. You may pull up the document from the free archive directly from the docket.
• Creates more useful file names to the pdf documents from PACER. The file names identify the court, case and docket entry number.

The Recap website has a 2 minute movie that illustrates Recap's features.

The documents donated to the Pacer Recycling Center, available in giant files on their website, will be integrated into Recap, along with Pacer dockets from Justia's site.

There is no searchable free archive of documents on Recap, at least not yet. Recap explains that this is due to privacy concerns.

Recap is new and in its Beta phase, so you may experience some glitches. When I tried it, it appeared to take a while before the R icon appeared in the docket next to a document I pulled up. It is well worth trying and Recap encourages comments and suggestions.

For free dockets (but not documents), see our prior post regarding FreeCourtDockets.com.

The SBA is holding its annual Locker & Book sale this week and next in the Student Organization offices in room 62.

Dates and times for this week are...

Wednesday, August 19th & Thursday, August 20th
Noon - 2pm and 4pm - 6pm

And next week...

Monday, August 24th & Tuesday, August 25th

Noon - 2pm and 4pm - 6pm

In addition to locker rentals and used books, check out the C-M Law gear...t-shirts, sweatshirts, mugs, hoodies and more.

Have you written a stellar note or seminar paper? Taking the next step and getting your work published can do wonders for your resume, not to mention your writer’s ego! The Library has put together a new Getting Published Guide that can help you take it to the next level and find a home for your article. The guide introduces you to several online journal submission sites, lists articles and sites offering tips for getting published, and clues you in on the value of retaining your copyright. The Getting Published Guide is one of over 80 free research guides written and updated by librarians at Cleveland-Marshall.

Steel yourself: the 1L reading load is no walk in the park. But what better way to distract yourself from parsing Marbury v. Madison than to flip through a fun, chatty, advice-filled book that weighs in at a mere half pound?

The recently compiled 100 Best Blogs for Law Students lists blogs written by law students, blogs about internship and financial aid, and more. Thanks to the Tax Prof Blog.

The University of Baltimore School of Law’s Center on Applied Feminism is hosting its Third Annual Feminist Legal Theory Conference. The conference will take place March 4-5, 2010 and has the theme “Applied Feminism and Marginalized Communities.” Contributors may choose to explore the concept of marginalized communities in a feminist legal context as applied to issues such as housing, welfare, domestic violence, human rights, and immigration.

Abstracts of paper proposals are due by October 16, 2009. For more information, see the clinicians with not enough to do blog.

First years are being asked to register their Westlaw and LexisNexis accounts before they come to Orientation. Why is it so important to register your Westlaw and LexisNexis accounts?

• We will be using these services to do exercises at Law Library Orientation.
• After a while, the Westlaw password and LexisNexis activation code will expire. In the past, the Westlaw password could be used over one's entire law school career to log in, without creating a custom username and password. That will change this Fall.
• You will need to use these databases for your Legal Writing class.
• Many professors have course pages on TWEN (Westlaw) or Blackboard(LexisNexis). You can not be registered on a course page if your Westlaw or Lexis account is not registered. Professors post readings and other important material on their course pages.

Courts that are known for their speedy resolution of cases and strict adherence to deadlines are often called “rocket dockets.” The original rocket docket is the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. The Court earned its nickname after Judge Albert V. Bryan, Jr., who was known for handling cases in a single day and general impatience with attorneys, litigants, and others. The Eastern District of VA has its own aptly named blog, “The Rocket Docket.”

The Supreme Court Database is a free web resource containing over 200 pieces of information about U.S. Supreme Court cases decided from 1953 to 2008. It is ideal for empirical researchers because searches can be run on all or selected parts of the database for variables such as how the Court took jurisdiction, origin of the case, the reason the Court agreed to decide it, issues, disposition of the case, winning party, formal alteration of precedent, declaration of unconstitutionality and how the individual justices voted. The database was originally available only in a format operable by statistical packages, but is now an easy to use web interface. The segment of the database searched can be limited by issues, years, case outcome, type of party and more.

Members of the public can also use the database as an easy way to find U.S. Supreme Court cases on a particular topic. The search form has a check box list outline of issues.

At the Law School, you will be able to set up your email account, register your Cleveland-Marshall password, and configure your computer so that you can access the CSU wireless network and be ready for your law library lab orientation. At the University, you will be able to get your Viking ID Card and parking pass. The Viking Card Office is located in the Main Classroom Building, Room 115, and is open until 5:00 p.m. Parking passes are available at the Parking Services Office, in the Chester Building Annex, that is open until 5:00 p.m. In addition, the Campus Bookstore will be open until 5:00 p.m.

The Law School Help Desk will be open from 3:00-7:00 p.m., with refreshments and maps!

The Global Business Law Review (GBLR), in association with the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, is now accepting submissions for upcoming issues. The editors of GBLR will consider papers on international business law topics. The deadline for submissions is open. For more information, or to submit papers, contact Arunesh Sohi at arunesh.sohi@law.csuohio.edu.

While hunting through the Main Library's Cleveland Press Collection, I stumbled upon a 1969 article discussing a plan to reorganize county government. See article. The reform plan appeared on the ballot that year. The plan is somewhat similar to the current proposal, with a county executive and seven county commissioners. For details on the current plan, see County Reform Plan has Something for Everyone, Amanda Garrett, The Plain Dealer, Aug. 2, 2009.

The U.K. based Society of Legal Scholars will be hosting the Learning in Law Annual Conference 2010. The topic of the conference is “Perspectives on progress,” and attendees will explore the concept of “progress” in the context of legal education today. The conference organizers welcome a global perspective on the topic. Deadline for paper submissions is September 18, 2009. The conference will be held at the University of Warwick on January 29 & 30, 2010.