USING THE INTERNET: A LAWYERS OVERVIEW

                                           by Greg D. Trapp, Esq.

Presented at the 1999 conference of the National Association of
Blind Lawyers held on January 31 in Washington, D.C.

                          INTRODUCTION

The internet seems to be everywhere.  E-mail addresses now commonly
appear on legal stationary and business cards.  Law firms have
their own web pages and advertise their services through the
internet.  However, despite the seemingly omnipresence of the
internet, most lawyers still do not have their own e-mail
addresses, and even fewer take full advantage of the remarkable
features that the internet offers.  This presentation will
introduce you to some of these features, and will hopefully
motivate you to access the internet for the first time.  For those
of you who are already using the internet, it is hoped that this
presentation will help you to discover new and creative ways that
the internet can benefit your legal practice.

                    LEVELS OF INTERNET ACCESS

There are a number of different levels of internet access.  All
lawyers can access at least some level of the internet, even if it
is through the auspices of a friend.

ASK A FRIEND:  The first level of internet access is to ask a
friend.  A simple request to a internet savvy friend to find a
particular case or statute may be all it takes to obtain a computer
disk copy of the desired case or statute.  This same friend might
also perform research of a particular company, search for a missing
witness, or search for medical or other articles relevant to a
specific aspect of a case.  Needless to say, treating this friend
to occasional lunches and dinners will help assure his or her
continued availability to help with the internet.

BASIC E-MAIL: Most persons begin their access to the internet with
basic e-mail.  While not normally a part of the Web, basic e-mail
is actually a very powerful legal tool.  E--mail can be accessed
with very basic technology, such as an older DOS based computer or
even a Braille-'n-Speak.  It is also possible to have some modest
access to the Web through basic e-mail.  Most persons who have
basic e-mail access will also have the ability to telnet through
the internet to bulletin board systems, such as NFBnet.  If you
have been good about treating your friend to lunches and dinners,
he or she may also be able to help you get started with basic e-
mail access.

WEB ACCESS: There are two basic levels of access to the Web, or
World Wide Web.  The first and oldest is through the use of a text
based Web browser such as Lynx.  While allowing access to most of
the features of the Web, not all Web sites support Lynx and other
text based browserss.  The move is away from Lynx to Web browsers
such as Netscape and Internet Explorer.  Fortunately, Web page
designers are slowly becoming more aware of the needs of blind
persons, and Web pages are gradually becoming more accessible.
Unfortunately, there are still many Web pages which simply do not
work well with speech access technology.

                          USING E-MAIL

When the Internet is spoken of, it is usually in reference to the
World Wide Web.  The use of e-mail seems to sometimes be almost
overlooked.  However, e-mail is a powerful tool for the lawyer, and
especially for the blind lawyer.

The popularity of e-mail has increased exponentially over the last
few years.  This trend has also carried over into the legal arena.
In many jurisdictions it is now possible to file court pleadings by
e-mail.  Attorneys in those jurisdictions can also receive rulings
and orders by e-mail.  If this was not reason enough to begin using
e-mail, attorneys can also use e-mail in more traditional ways,
such as reminding a client of an important upcoming meeting, or to
communicate with an attorney who is co-counseling on a case.

One of the primary advantages of e-mail is it's ability to make
communication quick and to-the-point.  It can also create a written
record complete with time notation.  However, when using e-mail, it
should be remembered that e-mail does not enjoy the same standards
of confidentiality as does the U.S. Mail.  Therefore, an attorney
must be aware of the nature of the e-mailing that is taking place,
and take appropriate steps to assure that attorney-client and
attorney work product privileges are protected.  You should
indicate in the body of the e-mail message that the e-mail is a
confidential communication.  You may be able to set your e-mail
program to automatically insert a statement at the end of your e-
mail message such as the following:

The information contained in this e-mail message is privileged,
confidential and protected from disclosure.  If you are not
the intended recipient, any dissemination, distribution or
copying is strictly prohibited.  If you think that you have
received this e-mail message in error, please e-mail the sender
at [log in to unmask]

While e-mail is an excellent method of communication, its true
power is rarely taken full advantage of.  One of the best features
of e-mail is its ability to send files as attachments.  This means
that a word processor file can be sent to an expert witness, to an
attorney with whom one is co-counseling, or even to an opposing
attorney.  When co-counseling with another attorney, the typical
practice is still to send fax copies of drafts of legal pleadings.
Unfortunately, to read a fax copy, the blind lawyer must usually
have the assistance of a sighted reader.  The print quality of a
fax copy is usually too poor to allow for efficient scanning or
reading with a CCTV.  Fax copies are even sometimes too poor to be
read by a sighted reader.  The ideal solution to this dilemma is
the use of e-mail.

While a deposition, pleading or other legal document can be sent in
the body of an e-mail message, an even better solution is to send
the document as an attached word processor file.  All that is
needed is to arrange for the document to be in a file format which
can be read by the person receiving the file.  Since depositions
are typically provided in ASCII (DOS text) format, this is not a
problem with depositions as ASCII files can be universally read by
any word processor.  In the case of a file saved in the format of
a specific word processor such as WordPerfect, it is necessary to
determine that the file can be read by the particular word
processor.  For example, MS Word can save and retrieve a
WordPerfect 5.1 file.  It is usually possible to find a word
processor format that both parties can read.  Of course, it is even
easier if you are using the same word processor.  It is also
possible to exchange Pre-Trial Reports and other documents with
opposing counsel through this method.  This can result in a
considerable savings of work and time.  However, at the end of the
drafting process, it is a good practice to have the final copy
faxed to assure that all of the desired changes and modifications
have been made to the final document.

Another excellent use of e-mail is to subscribe to listserves.  A
listserve is typically one of two things; a discussion group such
as blindlaw in which subscribers can have a dialogue; or a news
service which sends messages to subscribers.  Blindlaw is a
listserve sponsored by NABL, a division of the National Federation
of the Blind.  To subscribe to blindlaw, send an e-mail message to
"[log in to unmask]"  Leave the subject line blank, and In the
body of the message put "subscribe blindlaw."

There are a large number of listserves which deal with topics of
interest to the lawyer.  These listserves typically provide very
timely information on recent court decisions, provide legislative
updates, or serve as a forum for discussion of issues of interest
to the subscribers.

  It is also possible to use basic e-mail to search the Web.  To do
this, you send an e-mail message to a search robot which in turn
sends the search request to a standard Web search engine such as
Webcrawler.com or Altavista.com.  Though very limited, this can
still be a helpful tool for persons who do not have full Web
access.  One of these e-mail search robots is
[log in to unmask]  If you send an e-mail message to this
address, you will be e-mailed instructions on how to use the search
robot.

It is also possible to use the Internet to telnet to a BBS such as
NFBnet.  This allows you to avoid long distance phone charges which
you would accrue if you used your modem to call the BBS directly.
Not all Internet Service Providers (ISP) offer this option, and not
every BBS can be telnetted to.  The DOJ BBS, or instance, still
must be dialed directly.  If you telnet to NFBnet, which you do by
telnetting to NFBnet.org, you will find a large number of legal
files, especially those relating to the Americans with Disabilities
Act.

                          USING THE WEB

The World Wide Web is an incredible source of legal information.
This is especially the case in certain legal areas such as patent
law.  The Web is also an excellent way to obtain supporting
documentation.  For example, the Web can be used to search for
educational research materials relating to cases brought under the
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.  This is the case
because the Web is used as a depository for scholarly articles and
research.  As a depository of scholarly information, the Web is
also an excellent source to obtain documentation to be used to
research or impeach an opposing expert witness.

The real power of the Web comes from the "search engines" which
allow a Web user to search the vast materials which are available
through the Web.  These include Altavista.com, Infoseek.com,
Search.com, Webcrawler.com, and Yahoo.com (though Yahoo is
technically not a search engine).  In addition to these standard
Web search engines, there are also search engines designed
specially to perform legal searches, such as findlaw.com and
Lawcrawler.com.

While the Web can be used to find specific cases or cases on a
specific topic, attorneys should keep in mind that thorough legal
research must still be performed in the traditional way.  However,
as more and more legal materials are placed on the Web, the Web
will become more useful as a traditional legal research tool.
Perhaps the best function of the Web is as a way to obtain specific
statutes and cases which are in an accessible format.  These
statutes and cases can be read by the blind computer user without
the need to resort to a sighted reader.  This accessible material
can also be used to create a convenient database which can be
retrieved and read whenever necessary.

While the Web is a tremendous source of information, it must be
kept in mind that the Web is also an indiscriminate collection of
information.  The Web does not have a process of peer review.
Accordingly, while the Web contains a vast amount of valuable
information, it contains an even greater amount of material that
can be charitably described as "junk."  It is, therefore, very
important that the Web user be sure of the validity and veracity of
the source of the information.

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