Revised 8/2023

LGL 125 - Legal Research (3 CR.)

Course Description

Provides an understanding of the various components of a law library and emphasizes research skills through the use of digests, encyclopedias, reporter systems, codes, citations, American Law Reports, and other research tools. May include research through electronic database, overviews of computer applications and writing projects. Lecture 3 hours per week.

General Course Purpose

This course serves as a requirement for the Paralegal Studies AAS.

Course Prerequisites/Corequisites

LGL 110 for students in the paralegal studies program.

Course Objectives

At the conclusion of the course, students will be able to

• Perform legal research;
• Identify legal resources; and
• Research a legal case or problem.

Major Topics to Be Included

• Preliminary procedure in legal research
• Court reports
• Federal court decisions
• State court decisions and the national reports
• Digests for court reports
• Annotated law reports
• Citations

Optional Topics

• Restatements of the Law
• treatises and hornbooks
• loose-leaf services, periodicals and practice aids.