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30 lip 2024 · In this article, we define what a case brief is, list which elements to include in one, provide a step-by-step guide on how to write a case brief, offer brief-writing tips along with an example you can reference when producing your own case brief.
Case briefs are a necessary study aid in law school that helps to encapsulate and analyze the mountainous mass of material that law students must digest. The case brief represents a final product after reading a case, rereading it, taking it apart, and putting it back together again.
The goal for this part of your brief is to understand how the court used the rules of law to resolve the dispute. The court will state the applicable rules of law, and they can be found in readings from your textbook as well. You should summarize how the court applied the rules to the facts to reach its conclusions.
Rule. A judge resolves disputes by applying facts to a legal rule. The choice of rule is determined by the legal issue in dispute. Picking out the rule controlling a case is an important skill, because, of course, that rule is the statement of the law for which the opinion stands.
A rule states “if a certain condition exists, then a certain legal condition results.” Fn » Or if A, then B. In the example above, each of the two single arguments are about one element of negligence: sub-point A is about duty, and sub-point B is about injury.
Your case briefs will help you to remember the type of facts triggering a particular rule. If an exam question then asks you to analyze new hypothetical facts, you will be able to recognize any “triggering” facts and the rules they invoke, in order to predict the outcome of the new case.
A case brief is a dissection of a judicial opinion -- it contains a written summary of the basic components of that decision. B. Persuasive briefs (trial and appellate) are the formal documents a lawyer files with a court in support of his or her client’s position. Functions of case briefing.
