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Access to Justice -- by Fastcase

By Barbara Straczynski posted 08-18-2014 03:34 PM

  


Access to justice is a real and growing problem in the United States. In the past, it has been difficult to share the text of the law with clients and the public – so-called firewalls have previously prevented selecting cases or statutes and sharing them directly with those who don’t have access to Fastcase, LexisNexis, or Westlaw. Attorneys have had to jump through hoops to accomplish this for a while: typically by printing out the cases and sending them to clients. That’s an imperfect work-around to a problem that needs a solution. 

It’s imperfect because it takes time (and thus, money) to print or save documents and send them to clients. And what about prospective clients? There are any number of reasons an attorney would want to link to caselaw, statutes, or rules on their firm webpages or personal blogs. Previously, there’s never been a well-developed tool to do that. That all changed with the relatively quiet introduction of a new Fastcase feature, available to all active Bar members.

On the top right of every case, statute, rule, regulation (in short: any non-copyrighted document) in Fastcase, you’ll now see a blue hyperlink labeled, “Public link.” Clicking on this Public link will open a new webpage that is visible to everyone, whether or not they have access to the Fastcase service. Practice before a particular court and need to make potential new clients aware of some important rules of the court? Work for a bankruptcy firm and want to point out some important sections of Chapter 11? Want to share a link to some cases you’ve won? You can do all of that now with the Public link feature?

The Bar Association offers our members unprecedented access to the law for our members, and now we’re able to offer unprecedented access to your clients as well. We’re looking forward to seeing the creative ways attorneys will use this tool.

NJSBA members access Fastcase from the home page at njsba.com.

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