Improvements to Lexis Advance

Posted on Posted in Lexis and Westlaw
  •  Atleast command available – pull up documents where a word or phrase is mentioned at least a certain number of times.  This is a good way to find documents with an in-depth discussion instead of getting tons of results that just mention the search term in passing.
  • Litigation Profiles provide information on judges and lawyers.  A great way to prepare for a job interview.  To access, click on the red Research tab at the top left of  Lexis Advance.  Then select Litigation Profile Suite.
  • Shepard’s Grid view shows a colorful chart of the number of positive, negative or neutral cases in each jurisdiction.   Click on a box, eg. positive cases in the Sixth Circuit, to see a list of cases.  There is another chart showing cases by year  by treatment(positive, negative, etc.)  Shepard’s history also has a useful Map View, to visually show what happened in the case at various court levels and when.

shepardsgrid

Prior improvements are mentioned in these posts:

but a few bear repeating:

  • Topic Summaries – On most cases, click on Topic Summaries: View Reports on the right.  For various topics discussed in the case, (eg. felony murder or expert witnesses), get a definition, the major cases, secondary sources, elements, burden of proof and standard of review.
  • Legal Issue Trail – Select a paragraph in a case, and get cases that cite to the issue discussed in that paragraph.
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