On Dragons, Caves, Teeth, and Claws: Legal Analytics and the Problem of Court Data Access

Alexander, Charlotte; Feizollahi, Mohammed Javad

On Dragons, Caves, Teeth, and Claws: Legal Analytics and the Problem of Court Data Access

Computational Legal Studies: The Promise and Challenge of Data-Driven Legal Research (Ryan Whalen, ed., Edward Elgar, 2019, Forthcoming).

Georgia State University College of Law, Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2019-10

23 Pages Posted: 13 Feb 2019 Last revised: 26 May 2019

See all articles by Charlotte Alexander

Charlotte Alexander

Georgia Institute of Technology - Scheller College of Business

Mohammed Javad Feizollahi

Georgia State University - J. Mack Robinson College of Business

Date Written: 2019

Abstract

This chapter provides a case study of data access challenges in a legal analytics project that attempted to study all U.S. district court judges' decisions in employee misclassification disputes over a ten-year period. The chapter details the data assembly process, problems, and workarounds, and considers the implications for legal analytics and computational law, particularly projects that seek to study the operation of the courts and judicial decision-making across thousands of pages of text.

Keywords: empirical legal studies, information access, legal research, legal data, legal analytics, data analysis, court records, legal information

JEL Classification: K40, K41, K42, K49, K10

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Alexander, Charlotte and Feizollahi, Mohammed Javad, On Dragons, Caves, Teeth, and Claws: Legal Analytics and the Problem of Court Data Access (2019). Computational Legal Studies: The Promise and Challenge of Data-Driven Legal Research (Ryan Whalen, ed., Edward Elgar, 2019, Forthcoming)., Georgia State University College of Law, Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2019-10, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3330819