[blindlaw] Goal of New ABA Web Effort: All the Federal Decisions that Are Fit to Print, ABA Journal, November 17 2009

Tue Dec 22 23:41:32 UTC 2009

This sounds good in theory, but it is probably virtually useless in
practice.  

Those cases thought to be "newsworthy" or possessing some type of "sex
appeal" in the public mind, are usually not the kinds of cases we will be
interested in the day-to-day, nuts-and-bolts aspects of our respective
practices.

I read a sample of a one-day of output from this project and I was not
impressed. We can put this in the "something is better than nothing"
category.

Respectfully,

Russell J. Thomas, Jr.

THOMAS & ASSOCIATES

www.californiaemployersattorneys.com

Orange County Office                      

4121 Westerly Place, Suite 101

Newport Beach, California 92660                             

T: (949) 752-0101                             

F: (949) 257-4756

M: (949) 466-7238

Beverly Hills Office

9107 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 450

Beverly Hills, California 90210 

T: (310) 461-3561

-----Original Message-----
From: blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Nightingale, Noel
Sent: Tuesday, December 22, 2009 1:48 PM
To: 'blindlaw at nfbnet.org'
Subject: [blindlaw] Goal of New ABA Web Effort: All the Federal Decisions
that Are Fit to Print, ABA Journal, November 17 2009

Link:
http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/goal_of_new_aba_website_all_the_feder
al_decisions_that_are_fit_to_print
Text:
Goal of New ABA Web Effort: All the Federal Decisions that Are Fit to Print
Posted Nov 17, 2009
By Debra Cassens Weiss

Want to know more about a 9th Circuit opinion on the First Amendment rights
of a citizen ejected from a city council meeting for giving a Nazi salute?
Or the 5th Circuit opinion allowing a Halliburton employee to sue over her
alleged rape in Iraq?

You can find those opinions summarized on a revamped Media Alerts on Federal
Courts of Appeals page on ABAnet.org. Students and professors at four law
schools are choosing the opinions most likely to be of interest to
journalists and the public for the pilot project, sponsored by the ABA
Standing Committee on Federal Judicial Improvements.

The pilot project, which officially launches on Wednesday, now covers the
U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 3rd, 5th and 9th Circuits. The plan is to
eventually add all of the circuits.

Judge M. Margaret McKeown of the 9th Circuit, a special adviser to the
project, says the idea for the special coverage of the circuits grew out of
some discussions between judges and journalists at a meeting at the First
Amendment Center earlier this year.

About 60,000 cases are filed every year in the federal courts of appeals,
McKeown told the ABA Journal. "Most courts have very good websites, but
there is a lot of information out there, so this provides a special niche,"
she says. "There is a certain needle-in-the-haystack element for someone to
go through them every day in every jurisdiction of interest to find cases."

"Our view is that fair and accurate reporting about the courts is important,
both for the public and also in order to emphasize judicial independence,"
says McKeown, whose three-year term as chair of the ABA Standing Committee
on Federal Judicial Improvements ended in August.

Law schools working on the project are the University of Texas School of
Law, Temple University Beasley School of Law, the University of Arizona
James E. Rogers College of Law, and the University of San Diego School of
Law.

UT law professor Stefanie Lindquist says each law school is making its own
decisions on how the work gets done. At UT, Lindquist is supervising five
students this semester and seven next semester who are doing the work as
part of a pass-fail class she is teaching.

Students had to apply for the class, and Lindquist decided which ones made
the cut. One of the students is a former Dallas Morning News reporter;
others are on law review or will be going on to federal clerkships.
Lindquist and another professor handle the final edits.

"It's a wonderful teaching opportunity in the law school and a wonderful
opportunity to publicize information about the courts," Lindquist told the
ABA Journal. Students are trying to keep legalese to a minimum, and are
scouring the decisions for parties and subjects likely to be of interest.
Sometimes, she admits, the law can be pretty complicated, and the issues
"incredibly varied in terms of topics and substantive areas."

"It's actually not as easy as I thought originally," Lindquist says. "It's
fun, though-it's challenging and fun."

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