Become a Casemaker Expert
New to Casemaker? Want to learn about all that Casemaker can do? Need a review of how to look up something in Casemaker? You can attend our web-based training sessions at no cost as often as you like. Just click on the link for Webinar in Casemaker or visit https://casemakerlegal.com/registerwebinar.aspx to register! Using a Pin Cite Have a pin cite? No worries, Casemaker knows what to do. Enter the pin cite in the search bar and Casemaker will pull up the case that particular page is located in. Simple and easy! Related Federal You can select a jurisdiction or any combination of jurisdictions to search by clicking the Jurisdiction menu. This is located in the box located between the search box and the blue search button. There is a blue downward pointing arrow in the right side of this box. Clicking on this arrow will pull up the pop-up menu and from here you can check as many or as few boxes as you need. At the top of the list of states in the Jurisdiction menu, you will notice a checkbox for Related Federal. This tells Casemaker to not only pull cases for the state you selected, but also for the Federal District and Circuit courts related to that state. So if you select Virginia and also select Related Federal you will get not only Virginia state level cases but also the Eastern and Western District of Virginia court cases as well as cases in the Fourth Circuit. This means you will get cases from other states in your circuit as well, in the case of our example – Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina and West Virginia cases would also be included. However, this would again only be cases in your circuit, not any outside of it.
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Archives and Annotator in Administrative Codes
Casemaker is providing you with more tools to navigate administrative codes. Now not only does your state’s administrative code offer an archive of past versions but you also can use our Annotator feature. The Annotator feature, also available in statutes, let you know what cases have cited the code you are viewing. Once you click on a case in the Annotator list, you will be taken to exactly where the code you were viewing was cited in the case. Excluding Terms with a NOT search Are your results giving you a bunch of cases that are not relevant but still contain your terms? Do those irrelevant cases all seem to have a term in common? Maybe you should try excluding a term. For example, maybe you want documents that mention property but not commercial property. In the search bar, you can enter property NOT commercial and Casemaker will give you cases that mention property that do not contain the word commercial. Client Tracking in Casemaker Need to keep track of time spent doing online research for a client? Utilizing the Client and Session Summary features of Casemaker can help. Simply create a Client and select the client each time you begin to conduct research for that client. Once you have finished, click the Sign Out link to sign out of Casemaker and view the Session Summary. The Session Summary contains the date, time and client for each search, which can be used to keep track of billable hours for the client. Please remember to print this information as it cannot be retrieved after closing the Session Summary. Hierarchy Search
Casemaker now simplifies searching by limiting your search to the level of hierarchy you are on. If you browse to chapter 5 in your state statute and type a search in the search bar - you will only get results from within chapter 5. Archived Content You can find archives of previous years' statutes, rules, administrative code and session laws in Casemaker. When you click on any state you will see a blue bar labeled Archive. Clicking on Archive will bring up four options; Administrative Code, Rules, Session Law, and Statutes. From here you can simply click on the content you require and select the year you are seeking. You can also find previous versions by clicking on the Archive tab while viewing the current content. Simply bring up the current statute, rule, or code to read it's content then click on Archive in the grey bar above the content you are viewing. Then click on the year you wish to view. Finding a Case by Docket Number. Sometimes a case is so new you may not have a citation. If you have the docket number you can still find the case. Under the search bar on the homepage, you will see words with circles next to them. These circles are called radio buttons. The options you will see are Keyword, Citation, Party, Section, and finally Docket No. Make sure you have selected the correct jurisdiction from the jurisdiction menu drop down to the right of the search bar (it is the box with the downward pointing blue arrow); then select the radio button next to Docket No. Enter the docket number of your case and hit the blue search button. You should be able to pull up the case you are looking for. Go to Subsection
The Go To Subsection option makes it easier to navigate lengthy statues. Locate and load the statute you wish to view and use the Go To drop-down menu located above the statute in the light grey bar to jump to the particular subsection you are seeking. Printing in Casemaker While viewing a document in Casemaker, you will notice a set of icons on the far right in the dark gray toolbar. These icons allow you to print, email, save to a folder, and download. Let’s discuss Print. After clicking the icon for Print, you can choose the document format you are printing to. You can also choose if you would like to print the case in single or dual column layout. You can include highlighting for the terms you searched for, print the citing references, as well as the negative treatment if you have Case Check + access. Here you can attach your notes as well as a cover page. Once you are done you can click the blue Print button and the system will give you document to print out in the format you selected. Narrow by Circuit While the Jurisdiction menu will aid you to narrow your search to Circuit court cases, it will not allow you to narrow to a specific circuit. However, that option is still available! Once you perform your search, click to view all the case results. You can also click on the Cases link on the left. Either option will pull up your results list and a menu on the left side. This left side menu gives you the option to narrow your results by a variety of different ways. For example, you could use the Jurisdiction option to narrow to check the box for Circuit. Note you may have to click a link at the bottom of the category to get all your options. Next, you can the United States Court of Appeals you wish by checking off the appropriate box. Now your results should be narrowed to the Circuit court you prefer And Searches
The AND search is the simplest search to do in Casemaker. Simply put any number of words in leaving a space between each, and Casemaker will retrieve documents which contain all the words you mentioned. Contract binding will find the documents which mention both the word contact and the word binding. The search string handgun felony minor will find the documents with the words handgun, felony and minor in them. Please Note: You do not need and should not use the word AND in your search. The system already sees the space between your terms as an AND search unless you say otherwise. Using the word AND may yield the wrong results. Casemaker and Cosmolex Did you know Cosmolex, a leading cloud-based, law practice management software provider, is integrated with Casemaker to allow you to easily track and bill your research time? As part of this partnership, you can create a free trial with Cosmolex or attach your existing account to your Casemaker account. To get started simply click any of the Cosmolex links in Casemaker. After you click any of the Cosmolex links you will be shown a new screen with two options. To link an existing account, simply click the “Link my existing Cosmolex Account” button. You will be asked to log into CosmoLex and allow Casemaker to report time and information. Don’t have a Cosmolex account? You can get started with a free trial by clicking the “Start my free Cosmolex Trial” button. Finding Your Search Terms You’ve done your search with your keyword or keywords and you have pulled up your first result to read the case. Now, where in the world are your search terms even mentioned? You can find them using the Search Terms arrows in the gray toolbar. Located just above the title when you are reading the case is a gray toolbar. Here you see options to return to results, arrows to move around your list of results documents, as well as the phrase Search Terms with arrows on either side. Clicking on either arrow will take you to the next search term above or below where you are in the case you are viewing The Graph Icon
After performing a search you will notice to the far right of each of the results is a graph icon. Clicking this icon will plot, on a line graph, the number of times the case has been cited over the years. Hovering over the dots provided will tell you how many times it was cited in that year specifically, and clicking on the dot will provide you with a listing of clickable links to those cases from that year. Signing Out Upon clicking our Sign Out link you will be logged out of the system and provided with a Session Summary. This is a listing of everything you did while logged in. Complete with a date and time stamp, and client labels. Of course, the searches and documents are stored in your history as well! Browsing Statutes In Casemaker Browsing statutes is another great way to research your issue. At times, you may not know the exact citation for the statute that is relevant to your issue. On other occasions, you may want to see the surrounding statutes as well. Instead of searching, we can browse the statutes. Start by clicking on the jurisdiction you wish to view from the list of states on the homepage. Then click on Statutes. From there you can drill down in the Statute library to find what you need. Clicking on Titles, then on Subtitles, then Chapters and so on. There is a trail at the top of each page indicating what level of the hierarchy you are on. This can help you get your bearings in complicated statutes titles with many layers. New Casemaker Features
Getting Help Using Casemaker
Sometimes you just need a little help! Casemaker offers plenty of options to get you going. At any time you can click on the Help link in the upper right corner of Casemaker to find these options. Support is available between 8 am and 8 pm Eastern Standard Time, Monday- Friday. If you would like to speak with a Customer Support representative simply call 1-877-659-0801. You can email for assistance at support@casemakerlegal.com. Casemaker offers a live chat service during support hours as well by clicking on the Live Chat link in the upper right corner of Casemaker. Free webinar training is offered regularly as well. To sign up click on the webinar link in the upper right-hand corner of Casemaker. Training webinars are free and you can take them as often as you like. You can also find a user guide by clicking on the Help link in Casemaker if you prefer to learn at your own pace. You have History with Casemaker Perhaps you have found yourself logged out of Casemaker. This is normal – to protect your privacy, Casemaker will log you out automatically after time has passed without any activity on your part. However, you may be concerned you won’t be able to get back to what you were doing. Don’t worry! Casemaker can help! Casemaker keeps a history of your activity as you search and browse. You can access this at any time by clicking the History link in the upper right corner of Casemaker. At the History link, you can view what you had worked with previously. The data is marked with a time stamp and if you were working with the Client function, you will see the tagged Client information as well. You can also delete content from the History screen if you wish by selecting one of the options from the drop-down menu. You can Always go Home Again Click on the Home link in the upper right or the Casemaker logo in the upper left and you will be returned to the home page where you can find links to materials for all 50 states and federal jurisdictions, information about features, and links to archived statutes and acts. More Archives
Casemaker offers Archived versions of not just Statutes but also Administrative Codes, Session Laws, and Court Rules. Our archives are always expanding and we expect to bring you more material to help your practice. What do I need to use Casemaker? Casemaker supports the most up to date versions of Safari, Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome browsers. Casemaker also recommends users obtain the most up to date version of Acrobat Reader to read PDF documents. Just a reminder, to access Casemaker you must always login to your bar association website and click on the Casemaker link. Citecheck Citecheck saves you time by verifying all the citations in a document. Simply upload a document such as a brief, pleading or even just a list of citations, then in a few moments, Citecheck will return a report which indicates if there has been negative treatment on any of the citations in the document. Citecheck can be found under the Features tab (formerly Tools) on the main Casemaker page. Selecting Jurisdictions
Need to search all the documents in a state? How about all the documents in more than one state? You can select a jurisdiction or any combination of jurisdictions to search by clicking the Jurisdiction menu. This is located in the box located between the search box and the blue search button. There is a blue downward pointing arrow in the right side of this box. Clicking on this arrow will pull up the pop-up menu and from here you can check as many or as few boxes as you need. Special boxes are located at the top of each column. Related Federal will pull documents from any states you selected as well as the related Federal District and Circuit courts. All States will pull documents from all the state libraries. All Federal will pull documents from all Federal libraries. Accessing Casemaker - A Valued Member Benefit! Casemaker is provided to you as a benefit of your bar association membership. You get case law, statutes, rules, regulations and more for all fifty state and federal jurisdictions. To access Casemaker, simply log in to the bar website and click on the Casemaker link in the member’s area. You will be automatically transferred into Casemaker from the bar. Remember to access Casemaker you must go through the bar's website every time. To save time, bookmark the bar’s website! Once you are Casemaker you can register for free webinar training by clicking the Webinar link in the upper right of the Casemaker screen. How does Casemaker stay Current? Our headquarters in Charlottesville, VA has ten editors with over 275 years of experience in legal publishing. Data for State and Federal acts are obtained daily. The Acts are analyzed by a state editor, classified and effective dates determined. Then they are processed into the code which includes amendments, enactments, repeals, and re-numberings. The code is then published. Data is converted and delivered to the editorial team within 24 hours of receipt and the Acts are published in Casemaker within 24 hours of receipt. Statutes are updated and published within 7 business days of receipt of the Acts. This means statutes are kept up-to-date throughout sessions; statutes have added editorial value such as linked history lines, effective dates for all states, sections set out twice for postponed amendments, and retention of repeals in most states for historical reference; and materials are quality checked for completeness and accuracy. |
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January 2018
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