WATCH
First, here is the "Class" video for today - its under 20 minutes and covers the "lecture" portion of class.
PUBLIC RECORDS
As mentioned in the video, here is an additional video on backgrounding a person using a slightly different version on Lexis that journalists use, but the databases are very similar.
The CUNY School of Journalism has also created a very useful research guide on investigating people and business that is a resource on specific issues:
CUNY School of Journalism, Investigating People, Businesses and Nonprofits
I also want to highlight background research on companies and the extensive information available through our subscription to Bloomberg law as illustrated in the video below. Watching this will take 4 minutes from your life that you will never get back, but it gives a brief overview of the bells and whistles on Bloomberg of material available on publicly traded companies. You never know when information in here might be useful.
ETHICAL ISSUES
As mentioned in the "class" video, when "investigating" people as an attorney it is important to be mindful of potential ethical restrictions that may not restrict non-lawyers. Here are two NY ethics opinions that touch on these issues, one on the issue of using social media to develop evidence and the second on the issue of undisclosed taping of conversations by attorneys. They get into a lot of details, but note that the common theme is the concern that the attorney not engage in deceptive behavior or trickery.
New York City Bar Ethics Opinion 2010-2
New York City Bar Ethics Opinion 2003-2
I also want to highlight this second opinion because of its potential relevance to public interest related practice. In particular it notes that while, in the view of the New York City Bar Association, it is not ethical for attorneys as a matter of routine practice to tape conversations with individuals without their knowledge (even if it is not illegal to do so), it notes that it could be acceptable to do so on a case-by-case basis when it would further "a generally accepted societal good." Two examples it uses for this point are "criminal defense lawyers who may need to secretly record conversations with certain witnesses" and "the investigation of housing discrimination."
RESEARCHING JUDGES
The links to the resources I went through on Lexis and Westlaw are below if you want to go to them directly:
Lexis Advance, Litigation Profile Suite
Westlaw, Profiler
FOIA/FOIL
As mentioned in the "class" video - here is the page on federal FOIA and NY FOIL.
DO
Try to find (1) the current home address of Governor Andrew Cuomo, (2) how much the house he is living was purchased for, and (2) what is his attorney registration number in New York.
First, take 10 minutes and try to find this information via Google - the basic information is out there (in large part because he is a public figure and news articles have been written about it) - but it is not necessarily easy to locate. Then go to Lexis Advance (try this link, if that doesn't work go to the main Lexis Advance screen, look in the top left and click the down arrow to reveal a drop-down menu, click Public Records). Experiment with some of those resources, start with "Locate a Person." Try to find the information on Governor Cuomo and email it to me.
A few tips - remember that you might utilize information you can locate on Google (e.g., what's his middle name? what year was he born) in order to make sure your searches on Lexis are for the right Andrew Cuomo. Remember he may not be the legal owner of the house he lives in, so you may need to use his address to run another search to find the sale price records. We're using the Governor because he is a public figure, but consider the reasons why this research might be useful in legal practice, such as locating a witness, determining the owner of a piece of property, etc.
While you're there it also doesn't hurt to search for yourself or a friend and consider for yourself whether there is more or less information than you thought, whether the information is accurate, and whether it bothers you that this information is so readily available to others.
Thanks!