Using Case Citators
Case citators explained
A case citator is an index to case law. It provides a summary of the case along with additional information, such as:
- the litigation history
- the cases and legislation that were considered in the case
- how the case has been treated in subsequent cases
- commentary on the case in journal articles
- parallel citations (same case in different law reports)
- links to the full text of the case.
The University subscribes to two subscription case citators, CaseBase on Lexis + Australia, and KeyCite on Westlaw.
Free case citators that are also useful are LawCite (via Austlii) and Jade (via Barnet Jade).
You can search citators using the case name, citation or partial information such as the name of at least one party, the jurisdiction or court to find a case.
Is a case still 'good law'?
Both major citators (CaseBase and KeyCite) contain a signaling system so you can quickly identify whether a case is still 'good law'. Good law are judgments that are still being followed or applied by the courts, and is therefore still current and good law to rely on in your arguments. Below are the symbols used by the citators:
CaseBase
A negative (red) signal is given to decisions which have been subsequently reversed, not followed, disapproved or overruled
A cautionary (yellow) signal is given to decisions which have been subsequently distinguished, explained, questioned or varied.
A positive (green) signal is given to decisions which have been subsequently applied, approved, followed or affirmed.
A neutral signal is given to decisions which been either considered or cited (also 'referred to' or 'discussed').
A citation information signal is given to decisions for which there is only citation information available.
Keycite
A red flag warns that the case has been reversed, varied, disapproved or overruled on at least one point of law.
A yellow flag warns that the case should be viewed with caution, however the case has not been reserved, disapproved or overruled.
Depth of treatment
Green bars indicate the extent to which a citing case discussed the cited case.
4 bars - Examined – the citing case, administrative decision, or brief contains an extended discussion of the cited case, usually more than a printed page of text.
3 bars - Discussed – the citing case, administrative decision, or brief contains a substantial discussion of the cited case, usually more than a paragraph but less than a printed page.
3 bars - Cited – the citing case, administrative decision, or brief contains some discussion of the cited case, usually less than a paragraph.
1 bar - Mentioned – the citing case, administrative decision, or brief contains a brief reference to the cited case, usually in a string citation.
Any negative treatment of a case will appear under the Negative Treatment tab of the Westlaw document. Information within the History tab will also be useful when determining the value of the case for your research.
Australian case citator comparison
- Lexis+ AustraliaCaseBase is the case citator on Lexis + Australia.
- Westlaw AustraliaKeyCite is Westlaw's citation index and includes hyperlinked subject classifications to help find similarly indexed cases.
- LawCiteLawCite is AustLII's automatically generated case citator, which gathers information from the free legal information institutes worldwide, including Australia.
- BarNet JadeJade (Judgments and Decisions Enhanced) is a free current awareness service that collects recent decisions of selected Australian Courts and Tribunals. Jade can be used to search for Australian decisions, receive alerts on new decisions by email, and court digests by RSS.
Finding cases considering legislation
Many databases enable users to search for cases that reference a legislative instrument and provision via Legislation Title and Provision Number fields within the Case Law: Advanced Search forms. Another way to search for cases considering legislation is to locate the legislation on the database, navigate to the relevant section and see if there is a link for cited material.
- Lexis+ AustraliaSelect Advanced Search - Cases from the landing page and use the Legislation Title and Provision Number fields to find cases considering the legislation.
- Westlaw AustraliaUse the single search bar to search for cases, entering the name of the legislation as a phrase e.g. “Trade Practices Act 1974". You can also navigate to Cases and use the Advanced Search template. Enter the name of the legislation into the Legislation Cited (Title) field and use the Legislation Cited (Provision) field to add the section or subsection. These results use Westlaw's KeyCite citator tool.
- LawCite(AustLII) - use the search form, entering the name of the legislation and the section if relevant.
- JADEUse the Citator option, enter your search terms (legislation name and if relevant, the section) and press search. This will give you a list of cases that have cited the legislation you have searched for. You can also navigate to the legislation and view the Citation Report, or navigate to the section to view citation links bookmarked.
- Timebaseonce you have found the legislation you are looking for cases on, select the 'Key info' box to the right of the screen. Under the heading 'Related instruments' there is a link called 'Cases', click on this and a list of cases will appear which you can sort by year or court. You can also do this at a legislation provision level - at the provision level a box titled 'Cases' will appear next to the box 'Key info'.
Finding journal articles discussing a case
The case citators outlined above also include link to selected journal articles and commentary services discussing a case. To search for more journal articles, we recommend the following databases.
- Informit(Melb Uni staff & students only)
Select to search the AGIS Plus Text and Humanities & Social Sciences Collections databases.
Type the parties' names into the search box (eg: Koowarta v Bjelke-Petersen)
select - Legal Cases - from the drop down Field menu. - AustLII (Australasian Legal Information Institute) This link opens in a new window(open access)
Type the parties' names into the search box in this way: Koowarta near Bjelke-Petersen (using a 'v' between the party names will only find articles with the parties in the title - these will be highly relevant but you will miss other articles which discuss the case).
The most relevant articles will be listed first.
You can click on the context button to locate all references to the case in the article.
- Westlaw AustraliaIncludes Law Reviews and Journals within their Secondary Sources library. Indexes cases by topics which can be browsed via the Key Number System link on the landing page, or searched using the Key Number/Classification field on the Advanced Search: Cases search form.
- AGIS Plus Text (INFORMIT) (UniMelb access)Databases such as AGIS and the Humanities & Social Sciences Collection
Finding cases on a topic
Below are a series of steps for locating cases on a topic.
1. Start with secondary sources such as textbooks, which will cite significant cases on the topic.
2. Find relevant journal articles, use topic keywords to search:
- Westlaw Australia includes Law Reviews and Journals within their Secondary Sources library
- INFORMIT databases such as AGIS and the Humanities & Social Sciences Collection
- LawCite (Open Access)
- AustLII Journals (Open Access)
3. Use commentaries on the topic, such as those on CCH, Lexis + Australia and Westlaw Australia.
4. In addition to using secondary sources:
- Westlaw Australia indexes cases by topics which can be browsed via the Key Number System link on the landing page, or searched using the Key Number/Classification field on the Advanced Search: Cases search form.
- Lexis + Australia also enables searching of cases by topic from the Catchwords/Summary field on the Advanced Search: Cases search form. Legal Topics are also identified as a drop down option from the search bar on the landing page.
- Jade (free to access) can be searched by topic, catchword, tag or cloud.
TIP: the case law databases will find many cases, but not all will be significant - use books, articles and commentaries to ensure the importance of the case.