Search Help

To start your search (accessible by clicking on "Search ACJE Opinions" in the menu to the left), type search terms that describe your issue and click GO. Documents in which your search terms are near each other will automatically display towards the top of your results list.

SEARCH LOGIC

1. To retrieve opinions including ALL of your terms.

To retrieve opinions that include ALL of your search terms, list your search terms with spaces between them in the search box.

Caution: Do not enter words such as “NEAR” or “NOT” unless you want to retrieve opinions that include those specific words.

2. To retrieve opinions including ANY of your terms.

To retrieve opinions that include ANY of your search terms, type “OR” (in capital letters) between them.

3. To retrieve opinions that EXCLUDE one or more terms.

To retrieve opinions that exclude certain terms, insert a hyphen (-) before each term you want to exclude.

Example: A search for ART -MUSIC retrieves opinions that include the term “art”, but not the term “music”.

4. To retrieve opinions that include a PHRASE.

To retrieve opinions that include a phrase, enclose the phrase in quotation marks.

ADDITIONAL HINTS

1. To search for an opinion and all opinions that cite it, simply enter the opinion number.

For example: A search for 09-101 retrieves both Opinion 09-101 and Opinion 10-119, which cites Opinion 09-101.

2. Check your spelling.

3. Although the search engine does not recognize wildcards, you may retrieve opinions that include different forms of a search term by entering the entire root word.

For example: A search for START retrieves 16 opinions (as does a search for STARTS, or a search for STARTED, or for STARTING). But a search for STA retrieves no opinions.

4. Capitalization is irrelevant with one exception: You must capitalize the logical connector “OR”.

For example: A search for START OR BEGIN retrieves 30 opinions (all opinions containing either "start" or "begin"). But a search for START or BEGIN retrieves just 5 opinions (only opinions that contain all three words -- i.e., the word "or" in addition to the words "start" and "begin").