Introduction to Basic Legal Citation - access-to-law home

the unit that decided a case. When citing the same decision in another state there
would be no need to do so.
§ 2-215. Case Citations – Points of Difference in Citation Practice
Point 1: Whether to use parallel case citations and, if not, which citation to use is a subject on
which court rules often speak. The practice set out here is consistent with most of them,
although a few state rules call for citations of decisions from other jurisdictions to include
both an official reporter reference, if any, and a West regional reporter reference. See § 7-500.
Point 2: The ALWD Citation Manual rejects the dominant practice of including "Ct." when
abbreviating the many intermediate state appellate courts. Its abbreviation for the Kansas
Court of Appeals is, therefore, "Kan. App." rather than "Kan. Ct. App."
§ 2-220. Case Citations – Variants and Special Cases [BB|ALWD]
Most case citations refer to opinions that have already appeared in established print reporters
and their conformed electronic counterparts. Opinions for which that is not true either because
they are very recent or because the court or publisher of the relevant reporter did not consider
the decision important enough for such dissemination call for alternative identification. The
challenge in such a situation is to furnish the reader sufficient information to retrieve the
document from one or more specialized sources. (This is one of the problems addressed by
medium-neutral citation systems. See § 2-230.) The following alternatives can be used. While
they are listed in order of traditional preference, the ultimate choice should be made in terms
of the intended readers' likely access. (Before citing a decision that is not "published" because
of the court's own judgment about its limited precedential importance, be sure to consult the
court's rules. See § 2-250.)
§ 2-220(1) Examples
– Flamme v. Wolf Ins. Agency, [Insurance] Auto. L. Rep. (CCH) 18,307 (Neb. Nov.
8, 1991).
– Collins v. United States, 3 Fed. Est. & Gift Tax Rep. (CCH) 60,060 (W.D. Okla.
Jan. 31, 1991).
– United States v. Mena, No. 08-5176-cr, 2010 U.S. App. LEXIS 1121, at *4 (2d Cir.
Jan. 20, 2010).
– United States v. Mena, No. 08-5176-cr, 2010 WL 177220, at *1 (2d Cir. Jan. 20,
2010).
– Everette v. Astrue, No. C 07-3013 MEJ, slip op. at 6 (N.D. Cal. Feb. 9, 2009).
Alternative 1: With cases available in a print looseleaf service, the minimum ID or address
(following the parties' names (§ 2-210(a)) consists of:
• a full service citation, the court (abbreviated), and the full date.
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