Systems, methods, software for integration of case law, legal briefs, and litigation documents into law firm workflow

• US 20060195430A1
• Filed: 01/30/2006
• Published: 08/31/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 01/28/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Thomson Reuters Enterprise Centre GmbH (The Woodbridge Co. Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Thomson Reuters Global Resources
• Inventors: Anderson, Steven Brant, Arumainayagam, Yohendran
• Granted Patent: US 8,185,560 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/93 Document management systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

The present inventors recognized a need for improving conventional informational retrieval systems, particularly those intended for retrieval of legal information. Accordingly, they devised systems, methods, and software that facilitate online access to documents, such as non-opinion legal documents, in context of a legal workflow. An exemplary method of operation includes determining that a user of a client access device is performing a litigation-related task using a word-processing application on the client-access device. And in response to an affirmative determination, providing trial court materials relevant to the litigation-related task to the client access device without the user leaving the word-processing application. In some embodiments, the word-processing application is launched from a case-management application that provides case, activity, and role information to the online legal research system.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a server for an online legal-research provider, the server coupled to one or more databases; and

a client access device for connection to the server via the Internet and configured to access a case management system and a word processor application, wherein the server or device includes means for associating content of a document in an editing window of the word processor application with content of the case management system and content of the online legal research provider.

2. The system of claim 1:

wherein the case management system provides information identifying a legal client of a law firm associated with the client access device, a legal case associated with the legal client, one or more parties of the legal case, one or more attorneys associated with the legal case, and one or more legal workflow activities associated with the legal case; and

wherein the means for associating content of the document in an editing window of the word processor application is responsive to identification of at least one of the legal workflow activities to display on the client access device one or more options for accessing content of the online legal research provider.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein one or more of the legal workflow activities includes at least one of researching opposing counsel, researching a judge, researching opposing experts, finding a brief, anticipating a motion, responding to a brief, reviewing a brief, knowing when a client is sued, stating an argument, determining an attorney'"'"'s work load, discovering a litigation strategy, valuing a case, finding an expert, evaluating an opposing counsel, writing a settlement letter, proposing a jury instruction, setting up an appeal, pulling a docket, filing a complaint, filing a motion, and scheduling a settlement conference.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the document in the editing window includes a template or a document type associated with the one of the legal workflow activities.

5. The system of claim 3, wherein the content of the online legal research management system includes at least one of a brief, a trial-court document, a local rules document, a court docket, a jury verdict, a set of jury instructions, public records, and people information.

6. The system of claim 2, wherein one or more of the legal workflow activities includes at least one of the legal workflow activities includes at least one of a case valuation activity, a case negotiation activity, case preparation activity, a trial activity, and a post-trial activity.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the content includes medical records, civil verdict awards and settlement agreements, criminal plea agreements and verdicts, arbitration awards, valuation aids, statistical reports if the one of the legal work flow activities includes the case valuation activity.

8. A method of operating an online legal research system, comprising:

determining that a user of a client access device is performing a litigation-related task using a word-processing application on the client-access device; and

in response to the determination, providing trial court materials relevant to the litigation-related task without the user leaving the word-processing application.

9. The method of claim 8:

wherein the word-processing application is launched or initiated from a case-management application that provides case and activity information to the online legal research system; and

wherein the determination and the provided trial court materials are based on the case and activity information.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the online legal research system includes a server configured to host the case-management application.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the user is an agent of a law firm;

and

wherein the method further comprises automatically collecting the provided trial court materials for reuse by one or more other agents of the law firm without additional searching.

12. A system comprising:

a server for an online legal-research provider, the server coupled to one or more databases, including;

a subscriber database containing authentication credentials for a plurality of subscribers to an online legal research service;

a caselaw database containing a plurality ofjudicial decision documents; and

a database containing a plurality of court-filing documents, with each court-filing documents representative of an original litigation document filed in a legal dispute associated with at least one judicial decision; and

means associated with the server for returning search results to a client access device in response to information from a case management system regarding a particular activity in a legal workflow, wherein the search results identify one or more of the judicial decision documents or one or more of the court-filing documents and include at least one user-interface element for enabling a user of the access device to retrieve one or more of the identified documents.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein each court-filing document includes a brief, pleading, or trial exhibit.