CASE BRIEF

INTRODUCTION
Case briefing is a long-used method of studying law. Its purpose is to have students identify the
rules of law found in court cases and analyze how courts apply these rules of law to the facts of a
case in an objective and rational manner. Case briefing hones analytic skills and heightens
understanding of the role of courts in defining, interpreting, and applying law.. There is no single
standard for case briefing, but the structure below is common.
PURPOSES OF A BRIEF
  1.  Establishes a useful means of bringing the facts of a case back to memory in a short time, for
whatever purpose, including classroom discussion.
  2.  Allows you to extract from a judicial decision its future value as precedent. In other words, it
helps find the principles of law that the case sets forth.
  3.   A collection of briefs can provide a comprehensive summary of an area of law.
ELEMENTS OF A BRIEF
Many formats have been proposed by various writers. Also, a brief should be brief!  Several
basic components of a brief are as follows:
•  Facts
•  Issue or issues
•  Holding, including the rule of law
•  Rationale
FACTS
State the facts of the case in your own words. Indicate which facts are operative, and which bear
on the issues to be decided. Often a sign of how well anyone understands the case is the ability to
identify the relative importance of facts. The task is to frame the problem by describing the facts
that count, the ones that matter.
ISSUE
Issue spotting is the skill of recognizing in the facts a pattern that implies a certain type of issue.
For instance, facts that describe two people both claiming ownership rights over a chair should
spotlight an issue of ownership of personal property. Ask yourself what legal questions are posed
by the appealing party. The appealing party is alleging that an error of law was made. What is
that error? What question is the court answering? Sometimes a court will see the issue differently
than the parties and present a different twist on the issue. State the issue cleanly and crisply.
Avoid stating it in technical or procedural terms. Some believe that beginning your issue
statement with “Whether” will allow you to focus your statement.
Example: Whether Smith established legal ownership of the chair by physically possessing it for
seven years.
HOLDING
What is the ruling by the court? Who won? Answering these questions forces to identify the
outcome of the case. In reaching to a holding the following points may be considered:
How did the court decide the issue?
What rule of law is provided by the case?
RATIONALE
In fact, the rationale section is usually the longest section. In the rationale section you explain
why the court ruled the way that it did. This means that you need to describe the court’s
reasoning. In rationale it must also be explain which facts the court depended upon and which
ones it discounted or ignored. The prior decisions should also note, i.e. what prior decisions the
court looked at and whether it chose to follow them, overrule them, or differentiate them. The
court might also interpret or cite particular statutes or other laws in reaching its decision. Thus
the potential components to a court’s rationale include:
•  Facts: which ones were dispositive and which ones not
•  Prior cases that were followed, differentiated, or overruled
•  Statutory law and how it was interpreted
•  Public policy principles
The task of a researcher is to organize these components and explain how the court used them to
reach its decision..
      Returning to the chair ownership issue above, the holding does not tell us the “why” and, as
such, it is not really that useful. The rationale of the court, however, might describe how the
court relied upon a long history that ownership is not automatically determined by mere
possession, but instead depends on how possession and control was lost by a previous owner.
EXAMLPE BRIEF OF THE CASE
 Eric J. v. Betty M.
Here is a sample brief of the case of Eric J. v. Betty M. (Cal. Appellate Case 1999),
 Note that Facts and Rationale make up the bulk of the case brief. The facts have been retold in
the author’s own words. Not all facts were recited. The Rationale explains the court’s holding
and what it means as a rule of law. It cites the case law as well as the public policy that the court
applied. The Rationale also explains how the court dealt with a possible contrary case.
FACTS
Robert brought home his new girlfriend, Helen, and her eight-year-old son, Eric, to meet his
mother, father, brothers, and sister and their spouses. The relationship between Robert and Helen
continued and Helen and Eric were guests several times in different family homes. No family
member told Helen about Robert’s criminal history of felony child molestation. It was later
discovered that Robert sexually molested Eric during some of these visits at the family homes all
the while Robert was on parole for child molestation. Robert was convicted of molesting Eric
and sent back to prison. Helen filed suit against Robert’s family claiming they had a duty to warn
her about Robert’s criminal past and the potential danger to her child, and failing that duty they
were liable for money damages for the harm suffered by Eric. The trial court dismissed the case
on a nonsuit motion.
ISSUE
Whether the trial court properly dismissed the negligence claim based on the premise that family
members of a convicted child molester have no affirmative duty to disclose that information to
the molester’s girlfriend who has an eight-year-old boy.
HOLDING
The appellate court affirmed the trial court, holding that the family members had no affirmative
duty to disclose the information.
RATIONALE
The appellate court placed great weight upon the “no duty to aid” rule, developed “over the
centuries” in courts. The court noted that a special relationship is required to create a duty to
warn, give aid, or otherwise help another. Ultimately, the court found that no such special
relationship existed and found no other reason to suggest that the family members had a duty to
warn the girlfriend. The court cited several cases, including a California Supreme Court
case, Williams v. State of California that establish the “no duty to aid” rule. In short, a person
who has not created the danger or risk is not liable simply for failing to take an affirmative action
unless there is “some relationship” that creates a “duty to act.” The court rejected a case that
seemed to rule the other way, Soldano v. O’Daniels, by explaining that the facts in that case
clearly showed that the defendant had actually prevented someone else from rendering aid. The
court also noted that any decision to find a duty to aid in this case would interfere with family
relationships by creating “intolerable conflicts of interest.” Impliedly, this went against public
policy.