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Get a Judge's Eye View Into Your Briefs and Those of Your Adversary
October 27, 2021
Today's TechnoLawyer Buyer's Guide report covers brief analysis software with a new option for analyzing up to six briefs (one, two, or three from each party) to obtain case recommendations, citation warnings, quotation errors, and more.
Lexis+ Brief Analysis Gives You a Judge's Eye View Into Your Briefs and Those of Your Adversary
Lawyers are split about cameras in courtrooms but every lawyer would endorse cameras in judicial chambers. Imagine being a fly on the wall as judges and clerks analyze and discuss your briefs and those of opposing counsel. And what about their own research? What if they find case law you or your opposing counsel missed? Cameras in chambers is a pipe dream but the next best thing is now available.
Lexis+ Brief Analysis in One Sentence
Lexis+ Brief Analysis has a new "Judicial Brief Analysis" option for analyzing up to six briefs (one, two, or three from each party) to obtain case recommendations, Shepard's warnings, quotation errors, and more.
The Killer Feature
Comparing briefs manually involves a significant amount work. Lexis+ Brief Analysis compare up to six briefs and summarizes the results in a new dashboard that visually surfaces the differences in each party's briefs. You'll see the gaps in authorities and receive recommendations for potentially relevant case law missing from each argument — so-called "hidden law" that judges and their clerks may find and use.
You start by dragging and dropping up to three plaintiff briefs and then up to three defendant briefs. A few moments later, the new dashboard summary appears listing the number of case recommendations, similar briefs, jurisdictions cited, correct and incorrect quotations, Shepard's citations, and Extracted Concepts.
Each category breaks down the data by Plaintiff, Defendant, and Shared. The Shared view is an industry first that isolates the citations used by both parties. Extracted Concepts lists the major legal issues as determined by a patented artificial intelligence algorithm. You can edit these by plaintiff or defendant to fine-tune the case recommendations and similar briefs presented.
Without going any further than the dashboard, Quote Check lets you know which briefs have quotations errors and how many. Similarly, the Shepard's Citations section lets you know who cited overruled or at-risk cases as well as cases with positive treatment.
"Judicial Brief Analysis brings our best data science technology together with an elegant, easy-to-use interface," says LexisNexis Chief Product Officer Jeff Pfeifer. "Our unique dashboard view makes it easy to get an overview of all the insights found in a set of documents and to focus on key differences between documents on either side of a matter. Judicial Brief Analysis goes beyond traditional research and surfaces recommendations in context, which in turn drives greater confidence for the researcher."
The Lexis+ Brief Analysis dashboard shows you how the briefs you upload compare, including an industry-first Shared view.
Other Notable Features
Case Recommendations lists potentially relevant cases not cited in one or both briefs, showing you the "hidden law" that the court may use to decide your case. The three-way split for Plaintiff, Defendant, and Shared continues here and throughout Lexis+ Brief Analysis. The Shared view lists the party to which a recommended case applies, including the relevant passage from the case. In another tab, you'll find useful excerpts from and links to related treatises and Lexis+ Practical Guidance — checklists, annotated forms, and other drafting tools.
The Similar Briefs feature helps you find model clauses, counterarguments, and templates for a particular jurisdiction. Sort by motion type, court, and legal issue. Adjust the timeline to view only recent cases.
As noted above, the dashboard alerts you to Shepard's warnings and quotation errors. You can dig deeper into each using the Cited in the Documents and Quote Check tools. Both tools enable you to analyze these problems without leaving Lexis+ Brief Analysis.
Cited in the Documents lists the problematic citations, including the reason for the negative treatment. The Shared view lists cases cited by both parties so you can compare the different interpretations. Quote Check color codes quotation errors in red and correct quotations in green and shows the original source for comparison.
What Else Should You Know?
The new dashboard also displays when you analyze one brief instead of several. When analyzing just one brief, the Case Recommendations tool suggests cases and secondary sources for each passage of your brief with a citation.
Neil J. Squillante is the founder and publisher of TechnoLawyer, an award-winning network of free email newsletters for lawyers and law office administrators. Many consider TechnoLawyer newsletters the only ones they need. A Fastcase 50 award winner, Neil has a long track record of inventing successful advertising and publishing technologies and related best practices. Previously, Neil practiced commercial litigation at Am Law 100 firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher. He received his J.D. from UCLA School of Law and his B.A. from Duke University. At UCLA, Neil served as a Managing Editor of UCLA Law Review.
