How to brief a case

Sir,

Any Indian parallel you have knowledge of as Indian example will benefit layman's like me better !

Rgds

Sir,

Here is another version. I will let you know if I come across an indian version

How to Brief a Case

PLS 321 – Summer I, 2003

A good brief is a systematically organized summary of the most important components of a

case. A brief should rarely be more than a page or two in length, and it should provide the

reader with only the most essential information contained in the case. The trick is, of course, to

identify that important information and weed out the rest. The following outline describes the

components of a brief, along with a short descripttion of each:

1) Citation – your brief must include the name and location of the case. For example,

Draper v. United States, 358 U.S. 307 (1959).

2) Facts – next, you should include a very short summary of two different types of “facts.”

The sum of these two summaries should total no more than a paragraph.

a) Material Facts – you should answer the question:

i) What actually happened?

b) Legal Facts – you should answer the questions:

i) From what legal circumstances did the case originate?

ii) How did the case proceed through the system?

3) Legal Issues – next, you should discuss the major legal issues raised in the case (at this

court level, not at the lower court levels). Each of these should be about a sentence.

a) Specific Legal Issues – you should answer the question:

i) What specific legal question(s) does this case raise?

b) General Legal Issues – you should answer the question:

i) What more general question(s) does this case raise, or how might the specific

issues be generalized to other situations?

4) Holding – you also need to indicate the decision of the majority of the court. The

easiest way to do this is to simply answer the questions in 3)a) and 3)b) the way the

court has answered them (i.e. YES or NO).

5) Legal Rationale – here you must explain the reason given by the majority for their

decision. You should answer the questions (if they apply to the case):

i) What legal reasoning informed the court’s decision?

ii) What rules of law did they apply?

iii) How did the court interpret legal principles or documents?

iv) How did the court construe the facts?

6) Case Significance – here, you should discuss the importance of this decision to the

greater legal system. You should answer the questions:

i) How did this case serve to change or clarify the law?

ii) What existing legal questions, if any, are left unresolved by this case?

iii) What new questions, if any, does this case raise?

7) Related Cases – finally, you should include a list of cases related to this one. Cases

should be included if they were changed by this case, or have since changed this

case. You are not required so Shepardize these cases, so your list will likely not be

complete. However, the reading assignments may give you some clues as to which

cases to include here, if any.

For more help, please consult the following recommended source:

Van Geel, T. R. 2001. Understanding Supreme Court Opinions, 3rd ed. New York: Pearson

Education. ISBN: 0-321-08593-0.

thanks to mr baskarn