This entry begins a series of articles designed for new reference librarians (and law students with a zeal for research) who would like to learn more about the Law Library’s Electronic Research Resources.
For each resource, I answer the following questions:
- What sort of information does this resource contain?
- What is the coverage?
- How does the indexing or search mechanism work?
- For what sort of research would this resource be useful?
These descriptions supplement, not replace, the existing database descriptions.
Resource #1: Animal Legal Reports Services
According to the description in the Law Electronic Resources page, “Animal Legal Reports Services™ provides quarterly summaries of litigation in the emerging field of animal law” and “reports begin in fall 2003.”
When one arrives at the “IP Access” version of the website, the first page includes the cases summarized in the current issue. One can filter by subject, state, month, and/or year, and have the articles put in order by descending or ascending subject, action, state, or year.
The subject filter searches the subjects by keyword. This is helpful if one is searching for a word that appears in multiple subjects, such as “cruelty.” However, some articles are given the subject “dog” or “cat” to describe cases that need a more specific subject. For example, a search for “cat” retrieves one case with the subject “Cat Owner’s Emotional Distress” and another case with the subject “Cat” and the action “Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress.”
For each case, the authors provide a summary, the main issue, the result of the litigation, and a summary of the court opinion, and a citation. Some cases include an “editor’s insight” and others include “veterinarian insight” and an editor’s note. Some citations contain URLs. The “subject” by which the case is indexed does not appear in the actual report.
This resource would be useful to someone looking for cases on a specific subject related to animal law. It could also be used as a current awareness service.