printing poorly formatted legal statutes

[pickaname]

What is the name of your state? OH

I've been printing legal code off the web in a 2-up arrangement. Printing HTML is generally lousy if there is more than one page. There is no concept of keeping paragraphs together. If the page break happens just before half of the last sentence in the paragraph, FF and Chromium will just sloppily make the cut wherever.

And worse, unlike U.S. Code on cornell.edu, Ohio Revised Code is not indented, which makes it hard to read on the screen and on paper.

Are there any tools that will detect paragraph/section numbering schemes, indent appropriately, and perhaps even print each level of depth in a different color? If something could generate LaTeX code, it could even be smart about where to put a page break.

In principle, I should even be able to fold heavily nested and irrelevant code and highlight portions that will be presented to the court.

 

[NeilTheCop]

You may be better asking on a Adobe forum, as I believe the PDF software is capable of doing almost everything you ask including character recognition.

 

[HighwayMan]

This is not in any way, shape, or form a legal question and certainly has nothing to do with "civil litigation".

 

[Just Blue]

This is not in any way, shape, or form a legal question and certainly has nothing to do with "civil litigation".

At least the OP isn't asking where to get a good pressure cooker, like another member did over the weekend.

 

[Taxing Matters]

This is not in any way, shape, or form a legal question and certainly has nothing to do with "civil litigation".

I disagree. It has a lot to do with civil litigation, particularly taken in context with the OP's previous thread. The OP needs to have copies of statutes, regulations, case law, etc., on which he or she will rely in his/her trial to hand to the judge and opposing party in a small claims case since there won't have been briefs filed beforehand laying that all out. As a result, the OP wants to present this stuff in a way that is easy to read for the judge and opposing party.

 

[quincy]

For reference purposes, here are two of pickaname’s threads related to the civil action:

https://forum.freeadvice.com/threads/how-to-present-format-internet-published-evidence-citing-law-is-hardcopy-necessary-how-many-how-to-censor-sensitive-info.658451/

https://forum.freeadvice.com/threads/courtroom-does-not-have-a-printer-is-this-a-typical-problem-do-lawyers-carry-portable-printers.658513/

pickaname, I agree with Neil that you are probably best off asking technical questions on a different type of website.

 

[pickaname]

My question is highly specialized in the context of law. No generic Adobe tool would likely perform functions specifically for addressing the shortcomings of roughly formatted legal text. I should also say my question is not just about tools, but also about services. That is, the Ohio Revised Code website I found (http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/) is not necessarily the sole publication of legal code. It may be, but I would hope that lawyers have a better resource than that -- something that at least indents the nested levels.

This problem seems to be unique to the legal field. In all other cases where text is composed (novels, manuals, jounals, software programs, etc) the authors care about the layout of the text enough to indent for readability. It's only law publications where writers just dump the text without regard to readability, likely because it's not a work they're putting their name on.

W.r.t tools, it would be possible to have a tool import raw legal text, parse the enumeration counters (e.g. (a), (1), (A), (i), etc) and output LaTeX code that would indent automatically with color commands, along with code that prevents page breaks from splitting a paragraph. But I don't see how such a tool would be useful outside of practicing law.

The only thing remotely similar would be a "pretty printer" in the software development context. You would not ask Adobe communities for that because it's too specific. I would ask software developers if I wanted info about pretty printing code. Likewise, I would only expect lawyers to know how to pretty print legal code.

 

[Ohiogal]

Dude, you are in over your head when it comes to Ohio litigation. You are asking relatively mundane questions. The courts know the law. They don't need a copy. Goo grief.

 

[NeilTheCop]

I'm having trouble understanding what your issue is.
The formatting seems fine and easy to change. Cut and paste into Word, or the program of your choice, and edit to your hearts content.
http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/

 

[Zigner]

Or, retype.

 

[pickaname]

Dude, you are in over your head when it comes to Ohio litigation. You are asking relatively mundane questions. The courts know the law. They don't need a copy. Goo grief.

You're contradicting @adjusterjack, who said "The judge isn't going to be looking things up. Prepare hard copies":

https://forum.freeadvice.com/threads/oh-how-to-present-format-internet-published-evidence-citing-law-is-hardcopy-necessary-how-many-how-to-censor-sensitive-info.658451/post-3681892

I'm having trouble understanding what your issue is.
The formatting seems fine and easy to change. Cut and paste into Word, or the program of your choice, and edit to your hearts content.
http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/

That's very labor intensive manual work; work that a machine could do.

 

[Zigner]

You're contradicting @adjusterjack, who said "The judge isn't going to be looking things up. Prepare hard copies":

https://forum.freeadvice.com/threads/oh-how-to-present-format-internet-published-evidence-citing-law-is-hardcopy-necessary-how-many-how-to-censor-sensitive-info.658451/post-3681892

Ohiogal is an Ohio attorney.

That's very labor intensive manual work; work that a machine could do.

You CAN'T be serious.[/quote][/QUOTE]

 

[NeilTheCop]

You're contradicting @adjusterjack, who said "The judge isn't going to be looking things up. Prepare hard copies":

https://forum.freeadvice.com/threads/oh-how-to-present-format-internet-published-evidence-citing-law-is-hardcopy-necessary-how-many-how-to-censor-sensitive-info.658451/post-3681892


That's very labor intensive manual work; work that a machine could do.

And Microsoft Word can do it all.
Hopefully the moderators will allow the link, as it may be construed as advertising.
https://lawyerist.com/technology/microsoft-office/word/

 

[pickaname]

And Microsoft Word can do it all.

You can also build a house with nothing more than a hammer, chisel, and chainsaw. That doesn't mean it's wise to do so. Tools automate. Proper tools automate the job at hand. Tell me if I'm wrong but AFAIK MS Word cannot automatically detect paragraph numbers and apply a style.

 

[Zigner]

You can also build a house with nothing more than a hammer, chisel, and chainsaw. That doesn't mean it's wise to do so. Tools automate. Proper tools automate the job at hand. Tell me if I'm wrong but AFAIK MS Word cannot automatically detect paragraph numbers and apply a style.

If your matter is important to you, then YOU need to do some work.

EDIT: You could build an app/program to do this. You'd make a killing!