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Law -- Criminal Law Cases in the U.S. Supreme Court

 

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Helen Sheehy
Title: Head Social Sciences Library


Subject Specialist:
Law, Political Science, International Affairs
814-863-1347
e-mail: hms2@psu.edu

Social Sciences Library

 

Find Cases by Browsing

Black's Law Dictionary defines Criminal Law as "the body of law defining offenses against the community at large, regulating how suspects are investigated, charged, and tried, and establishing punishments for convicted offenders." There are several ways to find U.S. Supreme Court Cases related to criminal law issues.

Print Sources

Find cases by browsing the index at the back of each volume. To find Criminal Law cases, for example, you will choose a volume, turn to the back, and look for criminal law to be listed there. You will either find cases listed under Criminal Law, or you will find See or See also references that refer you to other areas of the Index for criminal law cases.

 

Online Sources

Note: [Penn State Libraries] indicates a Libraries' resource available to researchers with a Penn State Access Account:

Find Cases by Citation

A case citation provides you with the necessary information to find a case in either print or electronic resources and generally follows this format:

volume number + source abbreviation + page number

Thus, 410 U.S. 113 appears in

volume 410 of the United States Reports starting on page 113

Often you will find "parallel citations" to the same case as reported in West's Supreme Court Reporter (

 

Print sources

Supreme Court Cases can be found in:

 

Online Sources

Find Cases by Case Name

A case name is simply the names of the defendant and plaintiff (for example, Roe v. Wade).

Print sources

You will first need to determine the legal citation to find a case when you only have a case name.

Use the Table of Cases volumes (volumes 14 and 15) of the United States Supreme Court Digest to find the legal citation to a case name. Then use the citation to find the volume, reporter title, and page number on which the case appears.

 

Online Sources

  • LexisNexis Academic [Penn State Libraries]

    • enter the party names (plaintiff/defendant, appellant/appellee) into the By Party search box [under Look up a Legal Case]
    • alternatively, choose the US Legal button in the left-hand menu
      • choose the Federal and State Cases link
      • enter the party names, choose Party Names from the drop-down box
      • choose U.S. Supreme Court from the Jurisdiction drop-down menu

  • HeinOnline [Penn State Libraries]

    • choose U.S. Supreme Court Library from the list of Subscribed Libraries
    • choose the Search tab
    • choose Field Search under the default search box
    • enter the party names into the Case Title search box [just the names, no v. or vs.]

  • LoislawConnect [Penn State Libraries]

    • choose the Case Law link [under Type of Law]
    • choose U.S. Supreme Court from the list of courts
    • click the Continue button to proceed to the search menu
    • enter the party names into the Case Name search box

  • U.S. Supreme Court official website
    includes opinions back to the 1991 Term

  • OpenJurist
    includes opinions back to the first session in 1790

  • FiindLaw
    use the citation, case name, or full text search to find cases back to 1893