RE: [legalxml-courtfiling] Preliminary List of "Roles" in LegalProceedings

[John McClure <jmcclure@hypergrove.com>]

Well, in the world of OOP, objects only have properties (other than a pointer to
their class metadata). Given this, a role is as much a property of the Person
object as much as title is. Lin's statement refers to the notion that in the
world of RDBs, one creates an intersection table between its Person table and
its Case table, each row of which contains the Role being played by the Person
in the case (as well as pointers to specific Case and Person rows). Of course in
XML we don't worry about tables per se but we still worry about the cardinality
of each property associated with an object. For example, Lin's system probably
doesnt allow multiple titles for a given individual, but I think one should, in
an XML encoding, because that is the reality -- people are able to claim
multiple honorific titles -- while most RDB systems store multiple honorifics,
comma-separated, in a single field (a huge no-no for XML encoding), because it's
not worth the effort to establish a separate table keyed by Person.

I think a key question is whether in fact multiple Roles can be played by a
single Person in a single Case. Since I am but a neophyte in case management
systems, I haven't a clue. If the answer is yes, but very infrequently, I still
take that to be a yes, and would recommend that markup allow such statements of
fact. Besides that, I'd suggest that the name of what's being discussed be
sharpened to include the event in which the role is being played by the actor.
For instance, CriminalTrialRole would identifiy all the roles found in the
generic criminal trial. By 'chunking' the discussion in this way, much benefit
and faster progress is readily assured. If one is using a metadata markup
language that provides multiple inheritance (like, RDF), then the same role can
be a subclass of multiple categories. If not (like, XML Schema), then there's a
considerable challenge ahead.

I substantially agree with Roger's explanations of the distinction between Role
and Title. The statement about a "Judge" -- that one owns the title throughout
it all -- needs much more refinement I believe. To me, a Judge is BOTH an
honorific AND an occupation (as defined by the US Government). Yes, any Judge
can be an ElectedOfficial or an AppointedOfficial but, as you might suspect, I
would establish these as sub-terms of a QualifiedOfficial term, applicable as
they would be to any subclass of Judge (as an occupation). Anyway, what is
crystal clear to me is that "Judge" is not an example of a Role. Rather, for the
role fulfilled by a Judge in a CriminalTrial, I would suggest that such be
called a CriminalTrialJudge, a term within the CriminalTrialRole category, which
is a subcategory of LegalRole (or CourtRole or JudicialSystemRole), which is a
subclass of Role, which is a subclass QualifiedActor. [Aside: a Judgeship is
another interesting item, because it refers to the jurisdiction had by a
judge...] For the honorific case, I wouldn't establish Judge as a subterm of
Honorific -- rather, "Judge" is an *instance of* an Honorific and I suggest
publishing such as a resource standardized by LegalXML, like <Honorific
rdf:ID='http://www.legalxml.org#Judge'><en>Judge</en></Honorific> which can be
referenced then by systems in a standard way such as <Person><addressedUsing
rdf:resource='http://www.legalxml.org#Judge'/></Person>. While I'm at this, for
a role, I would hardly recommend a <Role> tag, but rather a more readable, more
intuitive, more explicit, RDF treatment, as in <Judge><actedAs
rdf:resource='http://www.legalxml.org/dictionary.rdf#CriminalCourtJudge'/></Judg
e> for the simple, non attributed referential statement, and for the more
complex statements that are sure to occur:

<Person rdf:ID='Person1234567'>
	<LegalName><en>John Marshall</en></LegalName>
	<addressedUsing rdf:resource='http://www.legalxml.org#Judge'/>
	<employedAs rdf:resource='http://www.legalxml.dictionary.rdf#Judge'/>
	<actedAs>
		<CriminalCourtJudge>
			<addressedAs><Honorific><en>Your Honor</en></Honorific></addressedAs>
			<at rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Location12345'/>
			<occurred><ElapsedPeriod><iso>2002-12-12/P4D</iso></ElapsedPeriod></occurred>
			<forEvent rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Case1234567'/>
		</CriminalCourtJudge>
	</actedAs>
</Person>
<CriminalCase rdf:ID='Case1234567'>
	<occurred><ElapsedPeriod><iso>2002-12-12/P4D</iso></ElapsedPeriod></occurred>
	<at rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Location12345'/>
	<presidedBy rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Person1234567'/>
	<prosecutedBy
rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Person7654321'/>
	<answeredBy rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Citizen12345'/>
	<arguedBy rdf:resource='http://www.MaineBarAssociation#Attorney321'/>
	<decidedBy rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Jury12345'/>
</CriminalCase>

Of course, this can be equally exchanged as

<CriminalCase rdf:ID='Case1234567'>
	<occurred><ElapsedPeriod><iso>2002-12-12/P4D</iso></ElapsedPeriod></occurred>
	<at>
		<CourtHouse rdf:about='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Location12345'>
			<PhysicalAddress/>
		</CourtHouse>
	</at>
	<presidedBy>
		<CriminalCourtJudge
rdf:about='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Person1234567'>
			<LegalName><en>John Marshall</en></LegalName>
			<addressedAs><Honorific><en>Your Honor</en></Honorific></addressedAs>
		</CriminalCourtJudge>
	</presidedBy>
	<prosecutedBy>
		<CriminalProsecutor
rdf:about='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Person7654321'>
			<LegalName><en>Joe Prosecutor</en></LegalName>
		</CriminalProsecutor>
	</prosecutedBy>
	<answeredBy>
		<Defendant rdf:about='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Citizen12345'>
			<LegalName><en>Jill Defendant</en></LegalName>
			<defendedBy>
				<PublicDefender rdf:about='http://www.MaineBarAssociation#Attorney321'>
					<LegalName><en>Jane Attorney</en></LegalName>
				</PublicDefender>
			</defendedBy>
		</Defendant>
	</answeredBy>
	<decidedBy>
		<Jury>
		     <consistedOf>
			<rdf:bag>
			<LeadJuror rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Citizen0121'/>
			<AlternateLeadJuror
rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Citizen0122'/>
			<Juror rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Citizen0123'/>
			<AlternateJuror
rdf:resource='http://www.USDistrictCourt/District5#Citizen0124'/>
			</rdf:bag>
		     </consistedOf>
		</Jury>
	</decidedBy>
</CriminalCase>

The whole POINT of a dictionary then is to identify the range of elements that
can validly be referenced by, or within, the "predicate elements" <occurred>,
<at>, <presidedBy>, <prosecutedBy>, and the others that "connect" two nouns.
Creating a hiearchical dictionary of terms is not merely an intellectual
exercise of passing interest -- it relates directly to the validation of XML
streams emanating from the judicial system. Now, it's been said that this seems
pretty wordy, but I daresay that such explictness should be an ongoing
requirement as more and more complex information structures are desired to be
transmitted in a reasonable, stable, fashion. Simply having a <Role> element
won't cut the mustard in the final analysis in my view.

For more information about this "style" of markup, please reference
1. "Make Your XML RDF-Friendly" at
http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2002/10/30/rdf-friendly.html
2. "RDF - What's it good for?" at
http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2002/11/13/deviant.html
3. "Ontology Building: A Survey of Editing Tools" at
http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2002/11/06/ontologies.html

Regards,
John

>-----Original Message-----
>From: John Messing [mailto:jmessing@law-on-line.com]
>Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2002 8:50 AM
>To: legalxml-courtfiling@lists.oasis-open.org
>Subject: RE: [legalxml-courtfiling] Preliminary List of "Roles" in Legal
>Proceedings
>
>
>Another way of looking at this may be that if there is a person
>object, a title is most clearly a property of the person object
>whereas the role is probably not.
>
>---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
>From: "Winters, Roger" <Roger.Winters@METROKC.GOV>
>Date:  Thu, 21 Nov 2002 07:40:27 -0800
>
>>As you have described it, then, does this follow?
>>
>>ROLE = something one enters and leaves. We all play many roles--father,
>>co-worker, civil servant, mechanic, mentor, penitent, child, caregiver, and
>>on and on. In a case, one may be the plaintiff but, on the stand, also a
>>witness; the next week, called for duty, a juror and, if a Judge, one owns
>>the title throughout it all.
>>
>>TITLE = something that sticks with one (unless revoked or modified). Being a
>>plaintiff is not to acquire a title, nor witness, nor juror. A medical
>>doctor who steps into (and out of) such roles would still be titled
>>"Doctor."
>>
>>Roger Winters
>>Electronic Court Records Manager
>>King County
>>Department of Judicial Administration
>>516 Third Avenue, E-609 MS: KCC-JA-0609
>>Seattle, Washington 98104
>>V: (206) 296-7838 F: (206) 296-0906
>>roger.winters@metrokc.gov
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Lin, Meng-chun [mailto:Meng-chun.Lin@usdoj.gov]
>>Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2002 4:03 AM
>>To: 'Winters, Roger'; 'Mohyeddin Abdulaziz'; 'Chambers, Rolly'
>>Cc: legalxml-courtfiling@lists.oasis-open.org
>>Subject: RE: [legalxml-courtfiling] Preliminary List of "Roles" in LegalPr
>>oceedings
>>
>>>From the programming point of view, the titles and roles are separate in the
>>federal courts' case management database.  A more common case is a retired
>>judge becomes an attorney and represents a client in a case.  The judge
>>retains his/her title, but plays different role in different cases.  Also,
>>under the party, there are different "party roles" in a case.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
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