Law Testimony and Trauma Library Research Guide

You can use legal databases  to access primary legal sources such as case law and legislation, plus commentary sources such as journal articles, and book content.  

Finding Databases

Lexis and Westlaw are two key legal databases. Other databases are also available so browse the full list of Law Databases once you have chosen your topic to identify which databases might be useful for your topic.

Searching the Databases

Once you have decided on your topic you can use that to search for content and see what sorts of materials are avilable to you.  Use the Online search tips to help you search the databases effectively.

This sceenshot from Westlaw shows that you can find varied content relating to the Grenfell Tower disaster. including case law, legislation and journal articles. 

You should bear in mind that full legal proceeding documentation is not publicly accessible.  If a case reached the higher courts you will be able to access a law report with the court judgment and any sentencing remarks, but the full proceedings including content such as witness testimony and court documents are not available.

Also, be aware that all not cases are reported.  High profile cases which are of general interest and look at facts and apply established law  are not usually reported in formal law report series. It is only cases that challenge issues of law that tend to appear before the higher courts and reach the law reports.

You should use the internet, news and audiovisual sources to help you trace this sort of information.  For example, some trials and tribunals are televised and local and national newspapers often report on daily events at high profile court cases.

Following events, interviews may be conducted with family members or communities,  or investigative documentaries may be produced to examine issues and attitudes. These may be available in audiovisual form such as film, tv ir radio broadcasts or podcasts etc.

You may need to access legal materials from a range of different jurisdictions for your project. 

Lexis & Westlaw

Lexis and Westlaw both have large collections of US materials and a varying degree of material from other jurisdictions around the world.   The other common law traditions countries such as Australia and New Zealand have more significant coverage than some other jurisdictions.

Where the jurisdiction you are looking at is not well respresented in these databases you can turn to Worlldii for freely available legal content. 

WorldLII

The World Legal Information Institute provides free, independent and non-profit access to worldwide law, through collaborqation with the various national and regional legal institutes. You can use it to explore the legal materials that are freely available for particular countries around the world. Find out more about WorldLII

Different amounts of information are available for each country.  Compare the differing coverage for Belize v Rwanda v United States.

If you are using a jurisdiction you are unfamiliar with then you may want to take a look at the international Encyclopedia of Comparative Law online.

You can choose a country and learn more about the setup of the country in terms of its legal system and constitutional arrangements etc