Cases from Texas' supreme and appellate courts are published in the South Western Reporter and the South Western Reporter: Texas Cases. Case law for federal cases is published in the Federal Supplement for decisions of the federal district courts, the Federal Reporter for decisions of the federal appellate courts, and the U.S. Reports, the U.S. Supreme Court Reports Lawyer's Edition, and the Supreme Court Reporter for decisions of the United States Supreme Court.
The South Western Reporter is available in full-text on Westlaw.
Federal reporter series are available in full-text on Westlaw.
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To find a case in a print reporter series, you must have a citation. The citation tells you where to find the case in the series.
South Western Reporter
South Western Reporter 2d
South Western Reporter 3d
South Western Reporter currently consists of 3 different series: South Western Reporter, South Western Reporter 2d, and South Western Reporter 3d. These are not series or versions in the sense of replacements but rather they keep building over time. Reporters are published in chronological order with the newest cases published in the latest volumes. When South Western reaches volume number 999, they simply start over at 1 with a new edition. So, to find the correct case, you will need to pay attention to the series number after the abbreviation for S.W. as well.
Print Location:
Legal Reference
KFT 1257 .W477
South Western Reporter 2D, vol.1-999 and South Western 3D are available in the Library. For the latest volumes, see Westlaw.
To find a case in South Western Reporter:
Case reports are published in reporters in chronological order. To find a case report in print, you need to know it's citation. The citation tells you: the name of the reporter series that it was published in, the volume that contains the report, and the page number where the case starts.
Using your case citation, determine which reporter series to locate. The abbreviation for the reporter appears in the middle of the citation.
S.W. 3d = South Western Reporter, 3rd series
Using the first number in your citation, locate the volume on the shelf.
Example: 329 S.W.3d 104 would be found in volume 329 of the South Western Reporter 3d
The last number in a case citation gives the page number where the report starts.
Example: 329 S.W.3d 104 starts on page 104
Reporters publish cases in chronologic order, so there are no updates or supplements to check.
Full, annotated versions of state and federal cases can be found on Westlaw.
(click on images to view larger)
Negative Treatment = Lists all cases that have had a negative impact on the ruling of the case that you are viewing. Negative Treatment is also indicated by Flags in front of the case name.
Red flag = The case is no longer good for at least one point of law. It was reversed or overruled
Yellow flag = The case has some negative treatment but it has not been reversed or overruled
History = Displays the case's history as it moved through the courts
Citing References = Provides a list of all cases or other documents that have cited your case since it was published
Description:
"Pick one of the two cases from the digest abstract and type a one to two page lawmen’s brief using the IRAC format. Find case on Westlaw and print out the first page."
Only currently registered Lone Star paralegal students can access Westlaw. Current paralegal students will receive an email to their MyLoneStar student email from Thomson Reuters with details on how to activate their personal account. For problems with this, please contact the Paralegal department.