Question

Do some quick internet research and find a case that deals with a will contest. Provide a brief summary of the facts of the case, and provide the court's analysis. Be sure to use a reference.

Answer 1

An appellate brief is a written legal argument presented to an appellate court. Its purpose is to persuade the higher court to uphold or reverse the trial court’s decision. Briefs of this kind are therefore geared to presenting the issues involved in the case from the perspective of one side only. When briefing a case, your goal is to reduce the information from the case into a format that will provide you with a helpful reference in class and for review. Most importantly, by “briefing” a case, you will grasp the problem the court faced ; the relevant law the court used to solve it , how the court applied the rule to the facts ; and the outcome . You will then be ready to not only discuss the case, but to compare and contrast it to other cases involving a similar issue.The first step in legal research is to write a statement of facts . Do this to help gain a complete understanding of everything that has happened, or is happening, in your case. Sit down and write out everything that has happened so far, and everything that is currently going on. Do include facts you consider unimportant. Sometimes facts that seem unimportant can make a big difference in the court process. Revise it to make sure is accurate and reflects the facts of your case.Make sure to include dates when each incident took place. Use those dates and your statement of facts to make a case timeline as well. On the case timeline, list dates from the time your problems started until the present day, along with the events that occurred on those dates. This easy visual reference will help you keep important dates in your case straight as you go through the legal research process.The second step is to get an idea of the legal problem you are facing, and what your ideal outcome at the end of the legal process would be. Simply figuring out where to start your legal research can often be a very hard part of the process. It may help to sit down and write down the issues you are facing, along with your ideal outcome. Also think about what a good compromise could be.Put simply, a case brief is a summary of a legal opinion. The term case briefis often confusing to lay people because the ordinary meaning of the word brief refers to a written argument submitted to a court (such as an “appellate brief”). However, a case brief is neither an argument nor submitted to a court. It is a study tool used by law students to prepare for class and final exams. A case brief might also be referred to as a “legal brief” or “case summary,” which better encapsulates the meaning and avoids the ambiguity of the word “brief.”To fully understand the law with respect to business, you need to be able to read and understand court decisions. To make this task easier, you can use a method of case analysis that is called briefing. There is a fairly standard procedure that you can follow when you “brief” any court case. You must first read the case opinion carefully. When you feel you understand the case, you can prepare a brief of it.Before reading a case, it is beneficial to have an idea as to what topic or specific legal issue the case falls under, why you are reading that case or what answer you are going to seek in the case. It also helps to sieve out irrelevant details and overlook issues not relevant to the legal question you are concerned about. For instance, if you are reading a case on contract law you can simply ignore the constitutional or evidence law aspect of that case without even mentioning it in your case brief. For a longer case, it is always a good idea to read a summary of the case first either from the case notes itself or from other web resources, if available. Also, while reading the case, you can work through the judgment in sizeable chunks and skim through the judgement looking for the most relevant parts which answer your questions. It is advisable to slow down your pace while going through these relevant parts in order to grasp the legal principles and their application in the factual matrix of the case.The best way to understand a case is to write a case summary of it. It clears all the stumbling blocks in your mind with the result being a clear understanding of the judgement which is always easy to remember. Writing a case summary forces you to ask yourself key questions and find the answers to the same through the entire process of writing the case brief. It helps you to develop a better grasp of the contents of the decision, learn application of the legal principles, recall them quickly and make critical remarks.