Finding results of court cases

[LosingGrip]

Quick question. I often see people posting case law. R V SMITH for example. Is every court case listed somewhere with the result and transcripts?

[Lonely]

When people quote case law in posts they are usually quoting what is commonly referred to as 'stated cases' or 'decided cases' where a precedence has been set by the judgement or outcome of the trial. These type of cases will be well reported in legal publications as they have an impact on future trials/prosecutions of the same nature.

Not every court case will be reported on but all court results are a matter of public knowledge and will be available from various sources - as here for example https://www.thelawpages.com/court-cases/court-case...

[Mojooo]

You can find Judgements here

https://www.bailii.org/

There are also some paid services like LexisNexis and WestLaw that may have more cases.

You will note for general court cases it only starts at High Court level so it will not include more minor disputes at county court or criminal proceedings at magistrates/crown court - which obviously make up the most of the day to day work of the courts.

[agtlaw]

Approximately no cases are reported. Only cases of significance are reported in the law reports.

A ‘stated case’ isn’t what the previous poster thinks it is and that terminology certainly isn’t used by practitioners to mean a decided case.

[HantsRat]

Best bet is to ring the court with accused, date and court number to ask for outcome or check your local paper.

[Jasandjules]

LosingGrip said:

Quick question. I often see people posting case law. R V SMITH for example. Is every court case listed somewhere with the result and transcripts?

No.

If you want the outcome to a specific case call the court and ask them.

[agtlaw]

Nanook said:

My mother's neighbour was recently convicted of something, and was sentenced last week.

They have a twitter feed, and a website, where you can read the Judge's reports on all cases.

Quite interesting really.

Scotland?

[Vaud]

Nanook said:

My mother's neighbour was recently convicted of something, and was sentenced last week.

They have a twitter feed, and a website, where you can read the Judge's reports on all cases.

Quite interesting really.

Link?

I think its a great idea - anything that makes the legal process more transparent and accessible is a good thing in my view.

[agtlaw]

Nanook said:

This was the page i was viewing:

http://www.scotland-judiciary.org.uk/8/0/Sentencin...

There's a link to their twitter feed there too.

Having just re-read it, it does state:

"In cases where there is public interest or where the sentence may be complicated or controversial, the judge may decide to make the sentencing statement more widely available. You can read the judge’s full statement here once sentence has been passed."

If that's anything like the English version of the same thing then I would anticipate that sentencing remarks in approximately 0.01% of all criminal cases in Scotland are published on that website.

[agtlaw]

Nanook said:

Fair enough. Cases involving paedophile teachers must be "in the public interest" then.

The website you said publishes 'all cases' actually publishes approximately one judgment each day.

[Well I Never]

Around 95% of all criminal prosecutions in England & Wales are seen to a conclusion in Magistrates' Courts. Records of these individual proceedings are only held by the courts concerned (although the anonymised results are held centrally). There is no general public access to these records.

[LosingGrip]

HantsRat said:

Best bet is to ring the court with accused, date and court number to ask for outcome or check your local paper.

I've had it before, phone them to get a result of a drug/drink drive arrest to be told they can't tell me over the phone. Phone up another time and yep they'll tell me without any problems at all.

Thanks for the replies

[anonymous-user]

Lonely said:

...what is commonly referred to as 'stated cases' ... where a precedence has been set

Commonly referred to as stated cases by, er... no one. You mean precedent.

As noted above, the final judgments and some interlocutory judgments in many (not all) civil cases decided in the High Court and above and many (not all) criminal appeal cases are published on a website called Bailii. There is no general publication source of every case before every court.

Edited by anonymous-user on Tuesday 2nd October 11:12