Case law

As cases and law reports are published in many different locations, there is no one place to search for case law. As such, it's important for you to know which databases are likely to include the case reporting series you require.

Browsing for case law

When browsing for case law, you will need to know which databases or publishers are most likely to include cases from the relevant jurisdiction, before searching those databases. The Finding Case Law section of this guide includes instructions for searching the most important databases for Australian, Western Australian and International cases.

Searching for a specific case

To search for a specific case, you will need the party name, case name and/or the full citation of the case. You will then need to complete the following steps to determine which database includes the case reporting series for that case:

1. Solve the abbreviation of the court reporting series into full using Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations
2. Search for the full name of the court reporting series using Library Search
3. Find the court reporting series on the correct database (e.g. Lexis Advance or Westlaw Australia) or Library shelves (e.g. All England Law Reports)

The Finding Case Law section of the guide also includes instructions for finding judicial considerations and sentencing remarks relating to a particular case.

To learn more about case law, see the "About case law" section of this guide: