Year 12s: what will be the first way you research your future options? >>

Mixed feelings when reading law reports/cases - how do you guys deal with it?

When I read some of these law reports, I get a mixture of feelings from sad, confused, happy and others. There's this one case where the plaintiff was taking the defendant to court simply because the latter cut the former's grass? I mean ... WTF? The argument was the latter was trespassing on the former's property but the latter didn't realise it, but still the latter was liable for trespassing. I think it was Basely v Clarkson (1682).

There's another case where this old lady wanted to tell the authority something (can't remember what it was, but it has something to do with reporting a crime and whoever reports it will get a reward); she was awarded the reward but she didn't want it. It ended up in court? :confused:

I mean, I know these are very old cases but still, some of it was so absurd, confusing (I asked myself "you want to bring that to court??"), sad and others.

I don't know; I think I've a reasonable "empathy" towards people or maybe I'm just inexperienced reading or handling these law reports that leads me to these mixture of feelings.

Have you guys gone through something similar? Any advise?

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 1

TheDefiniteArticle

The facts don't really matter that much. You ought to be able to summarise the relevant facts for nearly all cases within a short sentence. Focus on the legal principle you're looking for elaboration upon.

Reply 2

kka25

Original post by TheDefiniteArticle

A lecturer did mention what you said; "in law, judges/the law don't really care about the facts; it's the principle of the law and how you apply it to the facts that matters"