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GAZETTE
H N
N
JUNE 1992
Comput e rs in the Cour t room
in Support of Litigation
by John Furlong, Solicitor
The progress of a court case from a
client's first instructions to
completion generates a vast amount
of documentation within any office,
some of which will be created
internally on word processing
systems and some of which is
received from external sources. These
external sources may include the
firm's clients and legal counsel and
representatives for the other party or
parties in the case.
All of the documentation must be
constantly referred to, classified,
collated and copied. Distinctions
must be drawn between documents
which are available to representatives
of the other side and documents
which are not; documents which may
be produced in court and documents
which may not; documents which are
of primary importance and those
which are not.
A large litigation matter makes
substantial inroads on the resources
of any law Firm whether large or
small. In order to present a successful
case, the management and production
of documentation must match the
pressurised and constantly changing
requirements of the case from
commencement to completion. These
include:
• the need to identify and retrieve
specific documents or pages of
documents,
• the need to generate a variety of
reports for different participants in
the case,
• the need to retrieve rapidly
documentation in Court,
• the need to impose security
requirements on documentation,
• the requirement to illustrate salient
points in graphical form during
the court proceedings,
• the need to reclassify
documentation according to the
dynamics of the case.
Automated systems which can provide
the necessary classification and
indexing routines have become
popular in the United States. These
have generically become known as
litigation support systems. A basic
litigation support system is one which
allows for the building of a distinct
reference and retrieval system for an
individual litigation matter. In more
sophisticated systems, reference and
indexing is supplemented by optical
image storage of each individual
document. A further development of
the litigation support concept is the
ability to display relevant documents
on screen in the courtroom.
1
Even the proponents of litigation
support systems will emphasise the
need to do cost benefit studies of its
practical application in any firm.
2
The skeletal framework which is
suitable for one case may require to
be totally rewritten for another. In
addition to the capital investment
required (which can be substantial for
a sophisticated system), there are also
on-going costs in respect of data
entry; the establishment of indexing
routines and the operation of quality
controls and review.
At its most effective, litigation
support must be viewed as part of a
comprehensive automated courtroom
process in which the courts
themselves will make full use of
technology.
3
In Ireland, there has been some
limited use of technology in certain
court cases and tribunals. Court
administration has benefited from the
automated case tracking and
document generation systems in use
for a number of years in the Dublin
Metropolitan Courts and Limerick
District Court and which allow for
the speedier issue of fines and
warrants and the listing of court
dates. Similar systems will soon be
extended to other areas. Case tracking
systems are being installed at present
in the Cork, Dublin and Kildare
Circuit Courts.
A growing area in the use of
technology in the United States is that
of video display or recording, in some
cases linked to the transcription
service allowing for instant retrieval
of recorded evidence on screen.
The
Criminal Evidence Bill 1992,
currently
before the Oireachtas, will allow for
the use of similar technology in
certain cases in this jurisdiction. In
anticipation of the new legislation a
video system is being installed in at
least three courtrooms in the Four
Courts, Dublin. The technology will
allow for the handling of evidence in
child abuse cases etc. In time it may
also be used (as is the case in the
United States) for the hearing of
expert witness evidence from remote
locations or for the hearing of
evidence of prisoners from a secure
location.
Further reading:
(1) See the excellent review of
potential uses in "A future for
Courtroom Technology" Tina
Bondy,
Computer and Law
Vol. 2
No. 5 November, 1991. See also
"Information Technology in
Litigation" Timothy Bovey,
Law
Society Gazette
(London) 17
February 1988. "Technology and
the Courtroom" Nicholas Purnell,
New Law Journal
27 July, 1990.
"Managing the Paper Mountain"
David Cornwell,
The Lawyer
28
May, 1991.
(2) "Weighing the Benefits" David
Cornwell,
The Lawyer
11
February, 1992.
(3) "A Computer on the Bench"
Patrick Stevens,
Law Society
Gazette
(London) 5 February,
1992.
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