Legal research training
www.kenyalaw.org
Presentation made at the Africanlii training
by:
Linda Awuor Ochieng
lawuor@kenyalaw.org
July 29 – August 3rd,
2012
Johannesburg
Legal research is "the process of identifying and
retrieving information necessary to support legal
decision-making. In its broadest sense, legal research
includes each step of a course of action that begins
with an analysis of the facts of a problem and
concludes with the application and communication of
the results of the investigation.”
J. Myron Jacobstein and Roy M. Mersky,
Fundamentals of Legal Research, 8th ed. (Foundation
Press, 2002) p. 1
Sources of Kenyan Law
The Constitution of Kenya
 Acts of Parliament
Treaties and Conventions
General Principles of International Law
 English Statutes of General Application in force in
England on 12th August 1887
The substance of the common law, the doctrines of
equity and the statutes of general application in force
in England on the 12th August,1897, and the
procedure and practice observed in courts of justice in
England at that date
African Customary law
Judicial precedents
The approach of the NCLR in legal research support
for judicial officers/legal fraternity
Publish the information in books (KLR & Laws of
Kenya volumes)
Publish online – (www.kenyalaw.org)
Integrate legal research in electronic case flow
management systems
Provide a research support help desk – BRH
Provide legal research training
• induction training for judicial researchers
•Librarians training
•East Africa Community training on case flow
management
•Magistrates training
Provide continuing education and training on legal
research – CLE
Publishing an interdisciplinary journal – Kenya Law
Review Journal
www.kenyalaw.org
Case law provides the bulk of law in Kenya and
acts as a source of law through the mechanism of the
doctrine of precedent.
According to this doctrine, a court is bound by the
decisions of a court above it and, usually, by a court
of equivalent standing. Superior courts have the
power to overrule decisions of lower courts and in
certain cases to overrule their own decisions.
Because of this reliance, it is vital to find relevant
cases and make sure they are still good law.
Elements of a Case
Case decisions have many common elements.
The following are basic elements of a case on
www.kenyalaw.org
1. Parties Names
2. Case Number
3. Court Station
4. Judge(s)
5. Citation
6. Catchwords
Parties names
The concept of precedent
Date of
delivery
After a case has been decided, it can be applied to
subsequent cases, I.e. it becomes precedent for future
Judge(s) cases. The process of using cases in this way is called
stare decisis. Because of this reliance, it is vital to find
Court station
relevant cases and make sure they are still good law.
citation
Case search
General search
Has been integrated with the Google custom
search.
The Google search is simple, just type in
whatever you are looking for, case name,
number, judges name, cause list, date etc, click
the search button to the right of the tab or hit
the enter key on your key board and Google will
search the website for content that is relevant to
your search.
Case search
General search
The general search has been integrated with the
Google custom search. the Google search is
simple, just type in whatever you are looking for,
case name, number, judges name, cause list,
date etc, click the search button to the right of
the tab or hit the enter key on your key board
and Google will search the website for content
that is relevant to your search.
To make your search more useful keep
your search criteria simple.
The search engine is not human, it is a
program that matches the words you give to
pages on the website so use the words that
are most likely to appear.
The search is case insensitive and
punctuations are generally ignored but
ensure all your search terms are spelt
correctly.
Searching in general mode is suited for
finding any or all cases that contain a given
word, set of words or phrase used.
Specific Search
Searching in the specific search mode is suited for
finding a particular case when you have details that
describe the case at hand e.g. (names of parties,
case number, and date of delivery)
To find a case according to its details (names of
parties, case number, and date of delivery) one need
not fill in all the fields. You may use any one or more
search criteria; search using whatever information
you have.
Specific Search
Searching in the specific search mode is suited for finding a
particular case when you have details that describe the
case at hand e.g. (names of parties, case number, and
date of delivery)
To find a case according to its details (names of parties,
case number, and date of delivery) one need not fill in all
the fields. You may use any one or more search criteria;
search using whatever information you have.
Using only one or two search criteria will yield a
high number of results – using more search criteria
significantly reduces the number of results yielded.
When searching for a case using the names of
parties (specific search mode) you need not fill in all
the names. Any or two names of either party will
suffice. Similarly, if you are searching for a case by
case number, do not type in the entire length of the
case number (e.g. instead of entering “Miscellaneous
criminal Application No. 94 of 2004”, you may simply
enter “94 of 2004”)
Ensure all your search terms are spelt correctly. Try
to use alternative spellings of names, words or
acronyms appearing in your search terms.
Searching in general mode is suited for finding any
or all cases that contain a given word, set of words or
phrase.
Laws of Kenya
NCLR Mandate – to revise, consolidate and
publish the official Laws of Kenya
Through legal notice number 29 of 2009, the
Attorney General delegated his powers of law
revision to the National Council for Law Reporting.
To download the full text of a statute, on the Laws
of Kenya tab, the icon ‘Selected PDF Statutes’
contains the several statutes that have been fully
revised and converted into the format. This category
is however not exhaustive as the revision process is
still ongoing. All the laws can be obtained under the
‘Laws of Kenya Database’.
OR searches often produce large numbers of documents.
Combining search terms with the NOT operator narrows a
search by excluding unwanted terms. To find cases on
children but not infants the engine will search for cases
containing the word children and exclude all cases with the
word infant.
Boolean search terms may be combined in various ways to
carefully refine searches. Examples:
murder OR manslaughter AND sentence
advocate AND taxation NOT KRA
children NOT infants AND adoption
OR searches often produce large numbers of documents.
Combining search terms with the NOT operator narrows a
search by excluding unwanted terms. To find cases on
children but not infants the engine will search for cases
containing the word children and exclude all cases with the
word infant.
Boolean search terms may be combined in various ways to
carefully refine searches. Examples:
murder OR manslaughter AND sentence
advocate AND taxation NOT KRA
children NOT infants AND adoption
Kenya Gazette
Archive of the Kenya Gazette from 1906 plus selected
notices from current editions updated weekly.
 The search engine for the Kenya Gazette Archive has been
developed in such a way as to enable full-text search within
and across the entire collection of Kenya Gazette editions
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Hansard
Access to the historical and current records of the debates of
the Kenya National Assembly and previous parliaments or
legislatures dating as far as 1960 and coming forward
The Kenya Law Review Journal is a platform for the scholarly
analysis of Kenyan law and interdisciplinary research on the
law
Kenya Law Review Journal
The Kenya Law Review Journal is a platform for the scholarly
analysis of Kenyan law and interdisciplinary research on the
law
Kenya Law Review Journal
The Kenya Law Review Journal is a platform for the scholarly
analysis of Kenyan law and interdisciplinary research on the
law
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Kenya Law Review Journal
The Kenya Law Review Journal is a platform for the scholarly
analysis of Kenyan law and interdisciplinary research on the
law
Wakilishare
The Wakilishare Forum is an open and moderated discussion
forum on any subject concerning the law and the legal
system in Kenya.
Bench Research Hotline
Established in November 2006, the Bench Research Hotline
(BRH) is a research help desk whose mandate is to receive
research queries from judicial officers, conduct legal research
and provide feedback on the queries.
Supports the administration of justice by providing judicial
officers, especially Judges of the High Court and the Court of
Appeal, with dedicated research facilities taking advantage of
online legal database resources combining it with case law,
statute law, legal commentaries, and encyclopedic data.
Provide research assistants or a
research support help desk - BRH
1. Seek to understand the question posed (Do you and the
user have the same understanding of the question?)
2. Ascertain the time limit you have in conducting your
research.
3. Identify the primary sources of law, or primary authority, in
a
given
jurisdiction
regulations, etc.
such
as
statutes,
cases
and
THE BENCH RESEARCH HOTLINE
Query A
Feedback
Hard Copy
Query B
BRH
fax
Feedback
Hard Copy
Query C
Feedback
Soft Copy
Query D
Research Queries logged into a central system
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Continuing legal education training
The Law Society of Kenya officially made NCLR a certified
CLE provider. NCLR undertakes advocates training on
emerging jurisprudence in Kenya under the programme.
NCLR’s Research & Development Department will be the
responsible for the running of this activity. The department
is mandated to undertake continuous legal research on
frontier issues in jurisprudence and would be mainly
responsible in the preparation of material to be used during
the trainings.
Legal Research training
1. Role of legal research in case flow management – Judicial
officers from the East African Community
2. Librarians training
3. Magistrates training
4. Judicial Researchers induction training
Research steps
1. Seek to understand the question posed (Do you and the
user have the same understanding of the question?)
2. Ascertain the time limit you have in conducting your
research.
3. Identify the primary sources of law, or primary authority, in
a
given
jurisdiction
regulations, etc.
such
as
statutes,
cases
and
THE END