If you are eager to become a lawyer, you need to master many skills. Knowledge of how to write legal brief papers may help you not only in education but also in your future professional career. If you think that legal briefs are educational tools only, you are wrong. Professional lawyers frequently use legal briefs for appealing to a court with the request to consider some specific cases based on the past investigation.
What Is a Legal Brief?
A legal brief is an official legal document that contains facts about the case, reference to the law, and any pieces of evidence related to the issue. They usually include police reports and evidence of witnesses with the justification why the court should confirm the decision in favor of a particular person. Thus, it is an argumentative paper aimed at convincing a judge of making a requested decision.
Professional writing of a legal brief is important and requires practice as indicated by the writers at this service. It should be logical, with the use of professional language, and containing reference to the law. Also, it should comprise a clear objective of why you have decided to write a brief and what a judge should consider while reading it.
Define a topic
If you wish to succeed with your brief, you need to define a topic you are going to discuss and focus on it precisely. Each case has many aspects to consider. So, you may try to protect a client from different angles. It is a good idea to focus on a particular aspect and discuss it from different perspectives. You should choose a topic of your brief, and then write a logical paper. Take into account that a judge has hundreds of briefs for a check. If you start deviating from the topic trying to go deeper into the issues you do not need to focus on, your brief may become an excessive portion of reading with confusing statements and illogical conclusions. Don’t do that. Stay focused on your topic only.
List facts
When working on your legal brief, you may come across many facts and statements. Some facts may repeat in different sources. Not to lose the focus, you should create a list of facts you are planning to use in your brief.
- List the facts that refer to your case only. Do not try to seek some non-related statements just to cover the space and cite the law.
- Arrange your facts in some logical sequence. List the cases chronologically, divide them into those which support and reject your statement. You should also think about any other division that could help you arrange your facts.
- Highlight the facts that carry the major meaning for your case.
- Include a citation for the facts. It can help you cite the relevant sources when you compose your brief. When cases and facts have citations, you can operate these facts and find more details fast.
Check your draft
Drafting is one of the ways to structure your ideas and present a really worthy final paper. When you write a draft you include some basic facts and your opinion in the sequence you consider valid. Do not think that you spend time in vain when you prepare a draft. This is a chance to include all the ideas and then leave only the worthy statements.
Drafting helps you complete the paper with some flaws, while final writing polishes your paper. Also, it allows you to find the best way of presenting your ideas. You may make some notes while writing a draft and reconsider some ideas when you are aware of the final issue. You may have doubts about how to start your writing but when you have completed the paper, you will have a clearer vision of how to do it.
Make an outline
Apart from listing the facts you are going to use, it is a good idea to make an outline of the procedure. When you have a sequence of events in a case, it may help you write a logical paper. You should not skip from one idea to another. It can be easy for you to present the facts following the logical flow of events. An outline helps you include all the aspects you want to consider and do not omit anything.
Concurrences and dissents
One of your major responsibilities is to address concurrences and dissents in your case brief. Concurrences are the opinions of judges who agree with the decision but do not support the reasoning chosen. Dissents are opinions that do not support the taken decision as a whole. Thus, when you create a brief you need to include dissenting and concurring opinions of the judges, if any.
You should also cover some personal reactions and judgments. You need to either agree or disagree with the opinions and provide your justification. You should also refer to law, evidence, or police reports. Mind that your opinion is valid in a case brief only when you support it with the facts.
Emphasize the Last Point
Take into consideration that a legal brief is always a lengthy project. It does not usually fall into a couple of pages and takes more space to present the case and provide all the required ideas. If you use some general statements at the end of your brief, the judge considers these general statements only. At the end of the section of the whole writing, indicate the major idea and highlight the strongest aspects to keep the major issue fresh.
You may also compose the sentences choosing which aspect to stress. The last part is always well memorized. That is why, you may end a sentence on the most important part, the one you wish the judge to consider.
Edit and Proofread Your Writing
Proofreading and editing are two final steps in working in your brief. No matter how long and extensive your writing, you have to make a final check of what you have written. Pay attention to everything. Look at your paper from a larger angle and check the content. Assess logic and smooth flow. Pay attention to each word and sentence. Ensure that you do not have spelling, grammar, and stylistic mistakes.
Thus, if you do not know how to write legal brief papers, the article above has provided you with some basic information on this issue. You have learned how to work on the paper on the pre-writing stage and how to write your brief fast and with less effort. Even if a case brief is extensive writing and requires much time and effort, you may try to make the writing process easier with our tips. Apply for the court with successful and effective legal briefs and win each your case.