We recently wrote this overview of our current favorite pay investigative research database TLOxp for the Attorney at Work Website.

The day it was published, we learned about this new "Relationship Report" that TLO offers.

The post Every Lawyer’s Investigative Research Database – TLOxp appeared first on Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) in California, MCLE Los Angeles, CLE Orange County, Irvine & San Francisco.

Legislative/congressional materials are valuable to researchers for the following reasons:

• To track a current bill as it is going through the legislative process
• To discern the legislative intent of a bill
• To conduct historical research about a bill that was never passed (and, thus, would not be contained in a Public Law database or the U.S.C.)
• To read a public law in its entirety (instead of trying to piece it together once it has been scattered throughout various sections of the U.S.C.)

Searching the Library of Congress’s Thomas site for Bills, etc.

The Library of Congress’s Thomas site (http://thomas.loc.gov) offers various databases, such as:

From the home page, bills can be searched through the Bill Summary and Status (BSS) database, but only for the current Congress (http://thomas.loc.gov). Although you can keyword and phrase search the BSS, it does not search the full text of the bill. BSS only searches: sponsor(s); cosponsor(s); official, short, and popular titles; floor/executive actions; detailed legislative history; Congressional Record page references; bill summary; committee information; amendment information; and subjects (indexing terms assigned to each bill). Current bills can also be searched by Bill Number or browsed by sponsor at the BSS database on Thomas’ home page.

The BSS database also has an Advanced Search option (http://thomas.loc.gov/bss) where you can search by Keywords and Phrases (but still not the full text). They can be limited to Exact Match Only or expanded to Include Variants. You can also search by one or more of the following: Sponsor by House or Senate Members, Committee, Stage in Legislative Process, Date of Introduction, Type of Legislation, and Standard Subject Term. On the Advanced Search page, you can search back to 1973 (93rd Congress), except for amendment data, which only goes back to the 95th Congress (1977). You cannot search multiple Congress years here. You will have to select one Congress year.

The Bills, Resolutions “Bill Text” database, in contrast to the BSS, does search the full text of the bill and allows you to search through one or multiple Congresses, but only back to 1989 (http://linkon.in/IiVk24). Your keywords and phrases can be limited to Exact Match Only or expanded to Include Variants. You can also limit your search of Bills to: All; Bills with Floor Action; or Enrolled Bills Sent to the President. You can also limit your search of Bills to: Both House and Senate, House Bills Only, or Senate Bills Only.

It is not necessary to use quotation marks to indicate a phrase. For example, a user can enter think tank, not "think tank," to retrieve information about think tanks.

Bills and Resolutions can be browsed by Bill Number, Popular and Short Titles, Public Laws, Private Laws, Vetoed Bills, and Sponsor Summaries (http://linkon.in/IzhwiV). You can also browse the House or Senate bills separately by Bills, Joint Resolutions, Concurrent Resolutions, Resolutions, or Amendments.

The Congressional Record database (http://linkon.in/Hyzgds) goes back to 1989 and is searchable by Keywords, Phrases, Date Received or Session, Member of Congress, and Section of Congressional Record.

The Committee Reports database (http://linkon.in/HyAOnL) goes back to 1995 and is searchable by Keywords and Phrases, Report Number, Committees, or Date Available Online. The Reports can also be browsed by selecting House, Senate, Conference, or Joint.

The Public Laws database (http://linkon.in/HoTZam) cannot be keyword searched. Instead, the only option is to browse the Public Laws in numeric order. However, the database goes back to 1973, which is much farther back in time than the FDsys’s Public and Private Laws database.

Searching the FDsys site for Bills, etc.

For those who need to retrieve a document by its citation, visit the Retrieve By Citation page (http://linkon.in/Ij0nj3) and choose a Collection from the Collection drop-down menu. For those who prefer to browse, visit the Browse Collections page (http:// linkon.in/HyFAsc) and browse through various legislative/congressional materials by: (1) Collection (e.g., Congressional Bills or Congressional Reports, etc.); (2) Congressional Committee (e.g., Energy & Natural Resources); or (3) Government Author (e.g., Impeachment Trial Committee).

FDsys researchers can also keyword or phrase search (using simple or complex queries) through all of FDsys’s Collections together from the search box on FDsys’s home page (http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/search/home.action).

If you want to search fewer than all Collections (e.g., one or two, etc.), you would use the FDsys Advanced Search page (http://linkon.in/y2uMZC). To search, select a specific Collection from the “Available Collections” drop-down menu and click “Add.” You can continue to add more collections (or search all). After choosing the Collection(s) (and date if you wish), you can enter your keywords/phrases into the search box to the right of the “Full Text of Publications and Metadata.” If you want to search by other criteria, click the downward arrow to the right of “Full-Text Publications and Metadata” and you will be offered Collection-specific Search Criteria. If you select the Congressional Bills Collection, you can search by Bill Number, Bill Version, etc. but if you select the Congressional Reports Collection the criteria you can search by would be by Report Number, Conference Report, etc.

Using the Advanced Search also allows us to: (1) add specific dates (into the Publications Date box located at the top of the page) and (2) add five more search criteria options to any search.

According to the documentation at FDsys, its simple queries are similar to a “typical search engine such as Google” because FDsys uses the same Boolean connectors (AND, OR, -) as Google and phrase searching (where you surround a phrase with quotation marks). There are some differences, though: (1) Boolean connectors are case insensitive at FDsys while they must be in uppercase at Google, (2) FDsys researchers can also use NOT instead of the minus sign ( - ), since they are interchangeable at FDsys (but not at Google), and (3) FDsys researchers can use the Boolean connector AND or leave a space in between words (but Google scolds you if you type AND in between words).

• In addition, FDsys allows for the following types of complex queries (some of which are not found at Google): Proximity connectors (near/#, adj, before/#)
• Field operators, which allow you to restrict your keywords to specific metadata fields (parts of a document), such as: 
  • Congress Member: To search by this Field, enter your search this way— member:mcconnell 
• Wildcards, which are indicated by:
  • the question mark symbol (?) to replace one character before, within, or after a search term; 
  • the asterisk symbol ( * ) to replace one or more characters before, within, or after a search term. 
  • Typing int**city into the search box indicates a search for any word that begins with int, is followed by any two characters, and then ends with city. The search results might include the words intercity or intracity, or both words. 
• Parentheses, which should be used when creating complex searches such as those where you use multiple proximity connectors and/or multiple Field operators. The following is an example: 
  • (congressional OR executive) AND hearing AND (member:mcconnell) •

You can narrow your search results by Collection, Date Published, Government Author, Organization, Person, Location, or Keyword. For example, if you wanted to view a Congressional Report on a specific topic from 2004 and also 2011, you would select those dates from the left-hand “Narrow Your Search” column once you retrieved your results.

The Public and Private Laws Collection goes back to 1995 (for earlier years, see Thomas’s Public Laws and Private Laws). This Collection can also be used to update the text of a U.S.C. section (if it was later amended) or to learn if it has been repealed. For example, after reading the text of 22 U.S.C. 6208 at the House OLRC site, visit FDsys’s Advanced Search page (http://linkon.in/y2uMZC) and select the Public and Private Laws Collection, then select United States Code Citation criterion from the Search in drop-down menu and enter the U.S.C. citation (be sure to place periods in between each letter because “USC” will not work). Our search for 22 U.S.C. 6208, which was enacted in 1994, revealed six results, with the first result (Public Law 111–202) showing a 2010 amendment.

The Congressional Bills Collection can be keyword searched back to 1993 by choosing Congressional Bills at FDsys’s Advanced Search page (http://linkon.in/y2uMZC). There are eighteen different criteria to choose from and one or multiple Congresses can be searched. To limit Bills to a specific Congress or multiple Congresses, choose the Congress Number criterion. To search Bills by sponsor, you would select the Sponsors and Co-sponsors criterion. However, you would need to type in the sponsor’s name. We prefer the Library of Congress’s Thomas site for this type of search because there we are offered a list of names from which to choose.

The History of Bills Collection offers fourteen different criteria by which to search. While this Collection is not available at the Retrieve by Citation page, a Bill Number Citation search criterion is one of the fourteen criteria that can be searched by choosing History of Bills from the Advanced Search page (http://linkon.in/y2uMZC). If you don’t know which Congress a specific bill number was introduced in, you can search all Congresses (back to 1983) by selecting the Bill Number Citation and entering the bill number (e.g., enter s. 9 to search for the history of every Senate Bill number 9 in every Congress back to 1983).

The Congressional Reports Collection (also referred to as Committee Reports) offers twenty-one different criteria by which to search by choosing Congressional Reports from the Advanced Search page’s Available Collections.

The Conference Reports are not listed as a separate Collection, but can be searched by choosing the Conference Reports search criterion within the Congressional Reports Collection at FDsys’s Advanced Search page (http://linkon.in/y2uMZC). Dates of coverage go back to 1995.

The Congressional Records Collection can be searched by thirty different criteria back to 1994 by choosing it from the Advanced Search page’s Available Collections.

The Statutes At Large Collection can be searched by twenty different criteria (back to 2003), by choosing Statutes At Large from the Advanced Search page’s Available Collections. To search from 1951-2002, select the Additional Government Publications Collection from the Available Collections, then Publication Name (from the Search in drop-down menu. From the Select Value pop-up box, select United States Statutes At Large (Digitized).

The post How to Search Congressional Legislative Materials at Thomas and FDSys appeared first on Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) in California, MCLE Los Angeles, CLE Orange County, Irvine & San Francisco.

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Updated, searchable versions of the SSDI will apparently remain available at pay sites (like Ancestry.com). As of this writing, the Mormon Church-affiliated FamilySearch.org still offers a searchable version of the SSDI last-updated on October 31, 2011. Organizations will still be able to license access to the updated versions of the SSDI from the Social Security Administration's database vendor National Technical Information Service (NTIS). 

However, even the updated online versions of the SSDI and the Death Master File (DMF) everywhere also will be getting a lot less comprehensive (and useful). According to the Social Security Administration's (SSA's) database vendor National Technical Information Service (NTIS), effective November 1, 2011 the DMF will no longer include, "death records SSA receives through its contracts with the states, except in limited circumstances." According to NTIS, this will result in the removal of "approximately 4.2 million records from this file (as it currently exists) and add about 1 million fewer records annually." The use of state-supplied death information to the SSA is covered by The Social Security Act § 205r (42 USC 405).

Many researchers online point to the proposed "Keeping ID Safe Act of 2011" (KIDS Act of 2011) HR 3475 as the reason for the clamp-down on this information. One of the proposed laws stated goals is to prevent the Social Security Numbers of dead individuals (particularly children) from being used by identity thieves.

While the goal of thwarting identity thieves is a laudable one, this doesn't seem like the best way to do it. Perhaps Congress should be investigating updating and modernizing the SSA's computer storage and database systems or integrating the SSA system with the Internal Revenue Service's system in order to prevent the mis-use of the deceased's Social Security Numbers. An even easier fix would be to partially redact the Social Security Numbers included in the DMF and the SSDI. 

The post Rootsweb Removes Social Security Death Index (SSDI) appeared first on Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) in California, MCLE Los Angeles, CLE Orange County, Irvine & San Francisco.

The United Kingdom's Intellectual Property Office (IPO) has launched a new, free patent search - Ipsum.

Using Ipsum you can:

• View patent status
• View up to date information on patents
• Access some documents from published patent applications
• See which classifications and fields of search have been used
• Save your favorite patent applications in your bookmarks
• Get data on European Patents (UK). These may not include changes which have occurred in recent months before the EPO, but these can be found on the EPO Register

Searches may be conducted by Publication or Application Number. Searches by Publication number must be entered in one of the following formats:

• GBnnnnnnn
• EPnnnnnnn

The database is closed for maintenance two hours each week - from 8:00 PM - 10:00 PM UK Time.

The post UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) Launches Free Patent Search appeared first on Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) in California, MCLE Los Angeles, CLE Orange County, Irvine & San Francisco.

On August 30, the developer Michael Poulshock announced the release of version 4.0 of his Jureeka Web browser extension for Firefox. Version 4.0 for Chrome will be released in the near future. Jureeka is a free add-on application that you can download and install in your Web browser that automatically recognizes legal citations in Web pages you are reading and turns them into clickable links to those resources wherever they may be found on the Internet. With Jureeka installed, users can easily locate many of the cases, codes, regulations, and other law-related materials they see referenced in a Web article from a free source on the Internet. Jureeka recognizes numerous citation formats, including:

• U.S. Supreme Court
• Federal Reporter
• Regional Reporter
• State Reporter
• Federal Rules of Procedures (including, Evidence, Civil, Criminal, and Appellate)
• U.S. Code
• Public Laws
• Code of Federal Regulations
• Federal Register
• National Labor Relations Board cases
• Bureau of Indian Affairs cases
• U.S. Patents

Jureeka references to the Federal Rules of Evidence are just plain text.
After Jureeka those references to Federal Rules of Evidence are clickable links (noted by the double green underline).

With the announcement of version 4.0 for Firefox, also came news that Jureeka would now be powered by Cornell's Legal Information Institute (LII). "The LII now hosts Jureeka's legal citation redirection service and has assumed primary responsibility for the development and maintenance of the Firefox add-on. This allows Jureeka to reach a wider audience, to have long-term institutional support, and to integrate tightly with the LII's existing web services," according to Poulshock's blog post. According to the blog post, some of the changes in version 4.0 include, "redirection to specific subsections of the U.S. Code and to specific sections of the Code of Federal Regulations, which is quite helpful. Version 4 also includes an improved toolbar, a number of minor bug fixes, improved citation recognition, and fewer 'false positive' linkifications."

The Jureeka extension was first launched in late 2007.

Article first published as Jureeka Browser Plug-in Creates Links to Case Law Citations in Web Pages on Technorati.

The post Jureeka Browser Plug-in Creates Links to Case Law Citations, Rules, Decision, and Statutes in Web Pages appeared first on Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) in California, MCLE Los Angeles, CLE Orange County, Irvine & San Francisco.

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts has announced a pilot project in conjunction with the GPO's FDSys to provide free public access to opinions from a select group of courts.

The press release detailed how, "The one-year pilot project was approved by the Judicial Conference in March 2010, and the GPO received approval from the Joint Committee on Printing – often referred to as the oldest joint committee of the Congress – in February 2011." The press release lists no start date for the project. No courts are currently listed in the FDSys list of "Collections" available to search.

The pilot project will initially include 12 courts. They are:

• U.S. Courts of Appeals
  • Second Circuit
  • Eighth Circuits
• U.S. District Courts
  • Minnesota
  • Rhode Island
  • Maryland
  • Idaho
  • Kansas
  • Northern District of New York
  • Northern District of Alabama
• U.S. Bankruptcy Courts
  • District of Maine
  • Southern District of Florida
  • Southern District of New York

There has been some discussion on Twitter about the press release's reference to, "Free access to opinions in all federal courts is currently available via the judiciary’s Public Access to Court Electronic Records service (PACER)." Note that this only refers to opinions and not the underlying documents listed in PACER's docket search results.

While published opinions have been available for free on PACER since 2005 (see http://linkon.in/kgTanm), one advantage of this new arrangement between the AOC and GPO is to remove the necessity of first creating a (free) PACER account in order to access these opinions. Seattle-based communications researcher Robert Richards pointed out via Twitter, "But via PACER [Case Locator], one can't retrieve decisions directly, right? One must first retrieve docket, incur charge, then decisions?...That's not free access." So another advantage to the AOC/FDSys arrangement is to make the opinions completely free and easier to access.

However, Nicholas Moline, a programmer at Justia noted that, "[on] the top menu inside any of the court's ECF [sites] using a PACER login...you can retrieve the opinions directly by going to Reports => Civil and Criminal Reports => Written Opinions, this rpt [sic] is free."  (See illustration above.) In response (also on Twitter), Elmer Masters, Director of Internet Development for the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction. CALI, noted, "PACER's problem: not geared at public. Focus on lawyers, insiders. Hostile to pro se."

While "hostility" may be in the eye of the beholder, the access that Moline described is certainly less than ideal. It is neither intuitive nor apparent and you have to know the court in which a case was decided.

We are interested to see how many of the advanced search features (such as phrase, proximity, Boolean, and field operators) available in other FDSys searches will be available for the opinions once the project goes live.

Detailed information on how to search PACER, GPO Access, and its successor FDSys, as well as alternative sources for opinions like Justia and RECAP, is available in our books - "The Cyberslueth's Guide to the Internet: Conducting Effective Free Investigative & Legal Research on the Internet" and "Find Info Like a Pro, Volume 2: Mining the Internet's Public Records for Investigative Research."

Thanks to @Richards1000 for bringing this to our attention and @sglassmeyer, @carlmalamud, @emasters, @johnpmayer, and @nickmoline for the discussion on Twitter.

The post Federal Court Opinions to be Available from Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) and Government Printing Office (GPO) via FDSys appeared first on Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) in California, MCLE Los Angeles, CLE Orange County, Irvine & San Francisco.