Business Law 101 / Legal Research II- Florida Law Weekly

By Albert L. Kelley, Esq.

Last week I wrote about case law; what it is and how to find it. The problem with caselaw is that it can change at any time. If an appellate court makes a ruling on Monday, another appellate court can make a contradictory ruling on Tuesday. Which one is the law? And how do you find out? The answer is, at the time, they are both the law.   For example, if the Third District Court of Appeals and the First District Court of Appeals are hearing cases with virtually identical circumstances, they could and have come up with entirely different rulings. Both rulings are valid and both are the law, unless someone appeals the ruling or the District Court certifies the issue to the Supreme Court (More on that later). So if you have the same issue in a case in a Key West Court (Key West is part of the Third District), the Key West Court should follow the Third District’s ruling (however, as lawyers are bound to seek justice, we are required to advise the Court of the competing ruling in the First District, even if it goes against our position). Similarly, if you have the same issue in a Tallahassee Court (Tallahassee is in the First District), the Tallahassee Court should follow the ruling of the First District Court of Appeals. You can see that this can get confusing.

I mentioned above that there still could be an appeal of one of the conflicting rulings, or the Appellate Court could certify the question and tell The Supreme Court that the rulings conflict and they need the Supreme Court to solve the dispute. At that time the Supreme Court will hear both issues and determine which Appellate Court is correct, overruling the other case.

In addition to this, Courts can change their minds. Judges on the Appellate Courts change and their opinions and interpretations can change. Circumstances arise that were not anticipated in earlier rulings. All of these can lead to a Court reversing itself and issuing a ruling that contradicts a prior ruling.   Sometimes when this happens, the Court will actually state they are overruling the earlier decision; sometimes they just distinguish why the two rulings are different, and sometimes they don’t even acknowledge the earlier case.

To know the status of caselaw, you need two sets of books: Florida Law Weekly and Shepard’s Citations. I will start with Florida Law Weekly this week and cover Shepard’s Citations next week.

Florida Law Weekly is not actually a book set, but a series of booklets which contain those cases that were issued by the Courts during the previous week. This means that if you review the series, you will be finding cases within days of their being released, so your research will be more up-to-date. The series covers all of the District Courts of Appeal and the Supreme Court. Because they are printed on a weekly basis, it is difficult to do primary research through Fla. Law Weekly, but it is important that these cases be reviewed because at any time, a new case may overturn an older one. The last thing anyone wants to do is to give the judge a case that has been overturned. The cases appear in Florida Law Weekly in the same manner they will ultimately appear in the Southern Reporter series later, only without the book and page designation. Florida Law Weekly cases will specify the topic area the case involves, so they can be scanned quickly. There is also a short index that lets lawyers quickly find cases they need. Just remember, even though the cases are fresh, the day after a case appears in Florida Law Weekly, another Court may overturn that decision.

Al Kelley is a Florida business law attorney located in Key West and previously taught business law, personnel law and labor law at St. Leo University. He is also the author of “Basics of Business Law” “Basics of Florida’s Small Claims Court” and “Basics of Florida’s Landlord-Tenant Law” (Absolutely Amazing e-Books). This article is being offered as a public service and is not intended to provide specific legal advice. If you have any questions about legal issues, you should confer with a licensed Florida attorney.

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