In most Pennsylvania counties, the county bar association will regularly publish case reporters, also known as “side reports.” These publications provide judicial decisions on select trials from the county court of common pleas. Not every case in the county will be reported in the side reports; the bar staff selects cases and opinions that are of the most interest to other attorneys, such as those that set important precedents.
Side reports generally appear first as a paper pamphlet, called an advance sheet, and later as a bound volume collecting material from a year’s worth of advance sheets.
The Allegheny County Law Library previously collected physical copies of many counties’ side reports but this information is now available electronically through our legal databases. This makes many tasks easier and more convenient for users, such as searching by keyword rather than flipping through multiple indexes in physical books. So, we thought it would benefit users to know how to find the reports online.
The best place to find Pennsylvania side reports online is through LLMC. To access the PA side reports on LLMC:
- Log in to LLMC through the ACLL website.
- All patrons can access LLMC in-person at the Allegheny County Law Library.
- In addition, ACLL members get remote or in-library access to LLMC through the library’s website. If you’re not a member of the ACLL, you can register for a membership on the ACLL website.
- From the “Special Focus Collections” heading, click on “United States”.
- On the lefthand column, select “Pennsylvania” and “Journals & Newspapers” for the category. This should get you a list of all the side reports in Pennsylvania.
- From here, you can browse individual titles, or search using the “Filter by item” field.
- Additional information on how to search can be found in LLMC’s Help section.
If you want further assistance researching Pennsylvania law, or if you have any other questions, you can contact a librarian by stopping in, asking us virtually by filling out our Ask a Librarian form, or by calling 412.350.5353. We are here to help you.