Law

Case law is a primary source of law, and relates to decisions made by the judiciary in a court of law. Case law helps clarify how the law should be applied in different real-world scenarios where there is no consensus. A Judge or Judges make a ruling based on the facts of a case and their interpretation of the law applicable to their jurisdiction. Most courts follow a hierarchical structure – lower courts’ decisions can be overturned by more senior courts.

Not every case is reported, only those that make changes to how the law is interpreted provide clarification on a legal principle or there is a public interest to report. Historically reports of cases were only published in Law Reports, different series' of case reports which had to be purchased from a commercial publisher, however, since the early 2000s increasingly courts are publishing their own judgments. Most Law Reports are now available digitally via subscriptions to legal databases.

The following video provides information on searching for case law using different databases available to you through the Library.  A transcript of the video can be found here.