Big Open Legal Data:A BOLD Endeavour

Radboud WinkelsAccess to and Reuse of

EU Legal Information

Brussel, 21st March 2016

Outline

1. The Context2. BOLD for Legal Research3. BOLD for Legal Practice 4. Conclusions & Further Work

2

Context

� Many sources of law available online� Not all links/metadata machine readable� Not inter-linked

� Between types of documents� Cross-jurisdiction

� Typically not task or user oriented

3

(Open) Legal Data

Lawyers

Public Admini-strations

Case law

Legis-lation Doctrine &

Commentaries

LawFirms

Courts

Acts of Parliament

The Web of Law

Lawyers

Public Admini-strations

Case law

Legis-lation Doctrine &

Commentaries

LawFirms

Courts

Acts of Parliament

The Web of Law -2

Lawyers

Public Admini-strations

Case law

Legis-lation Doctrine &

Commentaries

LawFirms

Courts

Acts of Parliament

The Web of Law -3

Lawyers

Public Admini-strations

Case law

Legis-lation Doctrine &

Commentaries

LawFirms

Courts

Acts of Parliament

The Web of Law -4

Doctrine & Commenta

riesMinistries Companies

Places

Topics

Fields of Law

Etc. etc. etc.

Acts of Parliament

Possible Solutions - 1

� Human Enrichment (crowd sourcing)� Collections� Processes/lists� Annotations, highlighting� Translations� …

9

Case y

Human Enrichment

10

Art. xyz

My folderImmigration Law

Case x

Commentaryprof. XYZ

Dsdssd sdsd sdsdvsdv uiiuiiVsdvsd sdvsdvdv vds fb gnjuj ggfngn fgbn gfd

Adsd vv 4r56 sdsdvsdv uiiuiiF;l;lggg sdvsdvdv vds fb oiuik tooingn 547 bbn

Label 1

Label 2

Possible Solutions 2: Automatic Enrichment

� Natural Language Processing:� Finding and resolving references/citations� Making metadata explicit� Analysing content of sources of law� = Domain and jurisdiction specific*

� Network Analysis:� Finding related sources of law� Determining importance/authority� = Domain and jurisdiction independent

11

Case y

Natural Language Processing

12

Art. xyz

Case xCommentaryprof. XYZ

Dsdssd sdsd sdsdvsdv uiiuiiVsdvsd sdvsdvdv vds fb gnjuj case z fgbn gfd

Adsd art. 456 of law on uiiuiiF;l;lggg sdvsdvdv vds fb oiuik art. 547 §3

Dsdssd art. xyz sdsdvsdv xxyytVsdvsd uiiuii sdvsdvdv gfd vds fb gnjuj fngn fgbn gfd

Art. 456Sdv fboiefbd fbdbf dfvbdf dfvbdf law blabla fdbvry jyuk kimym uynymy

Fbbd sdsd dsvdfb 76hDfbn fdn vds fb gfn case y fgbn d dsd.Case z

D fb dfbdb fgnfgbb dfbdfb

Case y

Natural Language Processing

13

Art. xyz

Case xCommentaryprof. XYZ

Dsdssd sdsd sdsdvsdv uiiuiiVsdvsd sdvsdvdv vds fb gnjuj case z fgbn gfd

Adsd art. 456 of law on uiiuiiF;l;lggg sdvsdvdv vds fb oiuik art. 547 §3

Dsdssd art. xyz sdsdvsdv xxyytVsdvsd uiiuii sdvsdvdv gfd vds fb gnjuj fngn fgbn gfd

Art. 456Sdv fboiefbd fbdbf dfvbdf dfvbdf law blabla fdbvry jyuk kimym uynymy

Fbbd sdsd dsvdfb 76hDfbn fdn vds fb gfn case y fgbn d dsd.Case z

D fb dfbdb fgnfgbb dfbdfb

Network Analysis

14

Big Open Legal Data

for Legal Research

1977383

1978418

1979049

1980353 1980489

1981099

1982503

1982504

1982558

1982561

1982562

1982570

1983411

1984146

1984546

19845541984555

1984556

1984764

1985003

1985230

1985351

1985374

1985510

1985545

1985547

1986003

19860051986006

1986037

19865851986588 1986627

1986723

1987037

1987073

1987147

1987227

1987530

1987795

1987957

1988150

1988281

1988654

1988678

1988888

1988956

1989098

1989170

1989700

1989743

1989838

1990055

1990104

19904431990450

1990539

1990628

1990630

1990728

1990767

1991095

1991149

1991325

1991376

1991395

1991475

1991576

1991593

1992021

1992791

1992810

1993560

1993570

1994153

1994229

1994475

1995222

1995391

1996017

19966171996640

1996643

1997215

1998222

1998286

1998693

1999129

19991731999395

1999596

1999646

1999816

2000311

2000654

2001376

2001667

2002270

2002278

2002366

2002436

2003231

2003492

2003534

2004399

2004618

2005528

2006546

2006600

2008065

2008258

2008275

1978417

1980537

1984439

1984456

BOLD Examples for Legal Research

� Legal Prediction (Katz e.a., LexMachina, ...)

BOLD Examples for Legal Research

� Legal Prediction (Katz e.a., LexMachina, ...)� Life cycle of overruled Supreme Court

precedent

BOLD Examples for Legal Research

� Legal Prediction (Katz e.a., LexMachina, ...)� Life cycle of overruled Supreme Court

precedent� Impact ECJ rulings on parliamentary debate

� Link EP proceedings to ECJ data from EUR-lex

BOLD Examples for Legal Research

� Legal Prediction (Katz e.a., LexMachina, ...)� Life cycle of overruled Supreme Court

precedent� Impact ECJ rulings on parliamentary debate� Relation between fundamental rights and

the rule of law� Finding most authoritative cases� Finding best expert in legal field x� Finding problematic law articles� ...

Big Open Legal Data

for Legal Practice

1977383

1978418

1979049

1980353 1980489

1981099

1982503

1982504

1982558

1982561

1982562

1982570

1983411

1984146

1984546

19845541984555

1984556

1984764

1985003

1985230

1985351

1985374

1985510

1985545

1985547

1986003

19860051986006

1986037

19865851986588 1986627

1986723

1987037

1987073

1987147

1987227

1987530

1987795

1987957

1988150

1988281

1988654

1988678

1988888

1988956

1989098

1989170

1989700

1989743

1989838

1990055

1990104

19904431990450

1990539

1990628

1990630

1990728

1990767

1991095

1991149

1991325

1991376

1991395

1991475

1991576

1991593

1992021

1992791

1992810

1993560

1993570

1994153

1994229

1994475

1995222

1995391

1996017

19966171996640

1996643

1997215

1998222

1998286

1998693

1999129

19991731999395

1999596

1999646

1999816

2000311

2000654

2001376

2001667

2002270

2002278

2002366

2002436

2003231

2003492

2003534

2004399

2004618

2005528

2006546

2006600

2008065

2008258

2008275

1978417

1980537

1984439

1984456

BOLD for Legal Practice

� Legal Recommender Systems� OpenLaws.eu Project

Web of Dutch Immigration Law

A Legal Recommender System

23

Article in focus

A Legal Recommender System

24

Version of article in focus

A Legal Recommender System

25

Relevant other legislation

A Legal Recommender System

26

Relevant case law

co-funded by the European Union

OpenLaws.eu Project

27

User Interface

Open Data Interface

Open Data Importer

EUR-LEX UK AT-RIS NL ….

Co

mm

un

ity

BOLD Conclusions

Opening up and Linking Legal Data very useful for both RESEARCH and PRACTICE

OpenLaws.eu already offers: � Integration of Open Legal Data� Enriched Legal Data:

� Social enrichment enabled� Automatic enrichment to some extent

28

BOLD Vision 2020

� More Open Legal Data� More users� NLP for other languages� More user evaluations

29

Questions or Suggestions

winkels@uva.nlwww.LeibnizCenter.org