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Introduction to Legal Research

This guide is an introduction to legal research at the University of Melbourne. This guide is intended for law students in the JD, MLM , Breadth programs who are new to legal research. Students in other disciplines who may need to conduct legal research

Introduction to Finding a Case by Citation

You will come across citations to cases in your readings for law school and throughout your legal profession. A case citation is unique and the most accurate way to find a particular case. 

Earlier in the module we looked at case citation and case citators. Most case citators have a field called "citation." If you have a citation to a particular case, enter this information in the citation field. This short video introduces searching for a case by citation. The information below the video summarizes how to find a case by citation in each of the four Australian legal databases. 

Following is an example of searching for the case Pape v Commissioner of Taxation using the CLR citation (2009) 238 CLR 1 in each of the case citators: 

CaseBase (Lexis Advance)

 

Firstpoint (Westlaw AU)

LawCite (AustLII)

Jade

In Jade, if you are just looking for the case, use the search bar at the top of the homepage: