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Sometimes you need to search full text databases of court decisions to find cases on the topic.
This is particularly important for WA decisions which might not get "noticed" by publishers who produce indexes such as FirstPoint and CaseBase.
There are many online collections of Australian superior court unreported judgments. br>This topic will take you through the task of searching WA unreported judgments from the Supreme Court of WA.
Some of these decisions will be, or have been, selected for publication in one of the many subject based report series such as Australian Criminal Reports (ACrim R), Intellectual Property Reports (IPR), Industrial Reports (IR) etc., or in the series authorised by this court - the Western Australian Reports (WAR).
Most WA decisions are never published in a report series, and remain forever "unreported", however for WA lawyers they are vital.
Unreported judgments can be found in:
- Westlaw Australia 1999+
- AustLII 1999+
- Supreme Court 1991+
- Lexis Advance
The main subject index to reported Australian decisions is FirstPoint. CaseBase also provides an index-like service which lists catchwords for reported and, since the early 1990s, unreported decisions.
It is important to understand that when you search an index you are accessing the summary and analysis of expert editors.
When you search across full text documents you are accessing every word of the document and, unless you search carefully AND check carefully, you may have irrelevant material in your results.
Task: Source WA decisions that discussed the idea of "public interest" and the role of the media or journalists in reporting information.
Unreported Judgments
- Access the Advanced Search for Cases
- In the Terms search box type "good character" /25 violen!
- Navigate down to the Jurisdiction box and select Commonwealth
- Click on Search.
- You should have a large result list of over 100 records. Narrow this by typing migration in the Search Within Results search box.
- Narrow the results by Publication
- Expand the Publication filter
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Select from:
- Unreported Judgments Administrative Appeals Tribunal
- Unreported Judgments Federal Court of Australia
- Unreported Judgments Federal Circuit Court of Australia
- Unreported Judgments High Court of Australia
- Tip: You can select Multiple publications
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- Expand the Publication filter
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Results can be narrowed further by Court, Timeline, or Topic
Unreported Judgments
- Select the Cases search template
- In the Free Text search box type "good character" /25 violen!
- Navigate Jurisdiction box and select Commonwealth of Australia from the drop-down menu
- Click on Search.
- You should have a large result list of over 100 records. Narrow this by typing migrat! in the Refine Your Search box at the top of the screen.
- There are 2 cases listed from your search.
- Narrow the results by Product name
- Expand the Publication filter
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Select Unreported Judgments
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- Expand the Publication filter
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Results can be narrowed further by Court, Judgment Date, or Classification, Most Cited
Unreported Judgments
("good character" W/25 violen*) AND migration
Step 1: Access AustLII : http://austlii.edu.au into your browser toolbar.
Step 2: Click the arrow to the left of the "search" box, and then select "Advanced Search" from the drop-down menu.
Step 3: Go to the "Select the database(s) to search" box. Deselect all databases by clicking on the blue tick box next to "Select the database(s) to search...". Then click on the white box next to "Show all" to see a list of all available databases on AustLII.
- Select two databases by clicking on the box next to the title of each database so that it becomes a blue tick.
- For example, choose:
- Western Australia: Supreme Court, and
- Western Australia: Supreme Court - Court of Appeal
Step 4: Select "Boolean Query" from the banner at the top of the search page.
- Type "public interest" AND (media or journalist).
- Using quotation marks around "several words" means that phrase or that exact order of words will be found.
- This will result in a list of about 180 cases.
- An alternative "Boolean Search" option. Type "public interest" NEAR (media or journalist).
- This is a more focused search which brings the terms closer together. The results list contains about 44 cases.
Unreported Judgments
- Access Advanced Search
- Select the Boolean Query tab
- Enter your search terms ("good character" W/25 violen*) AND migration
- Check the box beside Select the database(s) to search... to deselect all databases
- Check the box beside Commonwealth: All Cases
- Click on Advanced Search.
- You should have a large result list of over 100 records.
- Sort the Results by selecting the By Database tab.
- Select the relevant Court
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Results can be sorted by Date, Relevance, Title and Citation Frequency
Look at the unreported judgments databases on AustLII, Lexis Advance and Westlaw AU to find Commonwealth decisions dealing with issues related to "good character" if someone has a history of violence, and Australia's non-refoulement obligations.
Tip: further refine the search results from the lesson using the word refoulement.
Which legislation was considered in these cases.