Gorham: Facilitating Access to Legal Information by Self-Represented Litigants: An Exploratory Case Study of the People’s Law Library of Maryland

Ursula Gorham of the University of Maryland has published Facilitating Access to Legal Information by Self-Represented Litigants: An Exploratory Case Study of the People’s Law Library of Maryland , Journal of Open Access to Law , 2(1) (2014).

Here is the abstract:

In recent years, through the development and implementation of programs specifically designed to assist self-represented litigants (SRLs), courts across the United States have demonstrated a renewed commitment to the principle of equal access to justice. The steady growth in the number of litigants representing themselves presents a challenge; courts, however, are increasingly relying upon technology to meet the needs of this growing population. This article offers an in-depth examination of the People’s Law Library (PLL), a statewide legal information and self-help website maintained by the Maryland State Law Library that seeks to connect SRLs with a wide range of resources to help them better understand the legal issues relevant to their situation as well as the court processes and procedures that must be followed. Based upon data collected through interviews with PLL stakeholders and a review of documents related to the development and implementation of PLL, this case study is guided by two key research questions:1) How does PLL facilitate self-represented litigants’ access to legal information, and 2) What challenges has PLL faced in facilitating this access? The paper then offers several recommendations, based upon findings from this study, for using statewide legal information websites to facilitate improved access to legal information by SRLs in the United States.

Filed under: Applications, Articles and papers, Case studies, Research findings, Technology developments, Technology tools Tagged: Access to justice and free access to law, Free access to law, Free access to law and access to justice, Free access to law and self-represented litigants, Journal of Open Access to Law, Legal information behavior, Maryland People's Law Library, Maryland State Law Library, People’s Law Library, Public access to legal information, Self represented litigants, Self-represented litigants' legal information behavior, Self-represented litigants' use of free-access-to-law services, Self-represented litigants' use of legal information



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