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Bar News - January 3, 2003 Search Pointers for NHBA Casemaker Library BAR MEMBERS ARE still road-testing the new NHBA Casemaker Web Library, which provides access to New Hampshire Supreme Court opinions dating back to 1872 - the most comprehensive coverage of NH case law offered by a non-commercial database - as well as administrative regulations, the 2002 Chaptered version of the RSAs, court rules, the libraries of several other states. The following are some preliminary suggestions - based on early feedback from users and from Lawriter Corp., developers of the database and search engine - on how to conduct searches and avoid potential problems with finding cases. (There have been several incidents in which cases in the database were not retrieved by an initial search. In most cases, these problems were rectified when coding was added to ensure retrieval of the cases.) Keep it simple. Most of the time, only one piece of information is needed to retrieve a case - the cite, a case number, party name, date or key words. It is not necessary - and it could introduce a greater possibility for an error-to enter multiple search items. Try, try again. If at first you don't retrieve... Because of occasional glitches, try a different search term if you have one. Also, see the "thesaurus" feature explained below. Don't use "and"/"or" words. To develop an "and" search that incorporates several keywords that should all be present in a case, enter the words, separated only by a space. For an "or" search, where either or any of the keywords appear, type the alternative words inside parentheses and separate them with a comma. (i.e., to search for homicides involving either a gun or knife, enter: homicide (gun, knife) For an exact phrase, contain it within quotation marks. Use a "thesaurus" search. Under the Advanced Search option, you can have Casemaker provide alternatives to a keyword. To expand the meaning of a word or phrase within your query, precede it with a tilde character (~). The thesaurus expansion feature allows you to expand your search to find cases that have words related to the keywords in your search. Entering DUI ~ wine will yield all cases that have the words DWI and wine, as well as cases that have words related to wine, such as beer, alcohol, etc. If you are having problems locating acase that you know exists, and you have tried several methods, contact us at nhbainfo@nhbar.org. We will respond as promptly as possible (within 24 hours during business days, in most cases). Some Bar members have asked whether they should stop subscribing to their current commercial research service now that Casemaker is available to them. As with any new product - especially one essential to your practice - we encourage you to try Casemaker out and see if it meets your needs before abandoning your current research methods. Use it as a convenient initial search tool or in tandem with your existing service until you develop a level of trust and comfort with Casemaker. And, if you are having difficulty with it in any way, please let us know so that we can respond to your concerns.
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