In order to reach the Supreme Court, a case has to work its way through (1) the trial court (District Court, possibly also a state court) and (2) the Court of Appeals. One of the parties then (3) petitions the Supreme Court for a hearing and Court either (4) accepts or denies the petition with a writ of certiorari (abbreviated Cert in a citation). Along the way, changes might be made to some feature of the litigation, such as (5) change in counsel, (6) a party joining the litigation, or a (7) separation of issues, and each of these becomes a document published in Westlaw and the print reports. Documents such as these are called memorandum decisions and are indicated by (Mem) in a citation. A case like the one described here would generate at least SEVEN documents in addition to the final judgment, and all the documents would have the same case name. How do you know which one you want?

When you get a long list of what appear to be identical cases, look at the information under the title.

In the example below, a case name search for Campbell v. Acuff-Rose resulted in 6 documents. Of the 3 displayed in the illustration, which one is the Supreme Court case we're looking for?

• It can't be the first one, because the citation 25 F.3d 297 indicates that it's a Court of Appeals case, not a Supreme Court case. Also, the parties' names are reversed.
• It can't be the last three because the parties' names are reversed.
• It can't be the third one, because the (Mem) indicates it's a memorandum decision.
• So the case we want is the second record: Campbell v. Acuff-Rose, 510 U.S. 569.