3. Building Your Case

Now that you have learned a few legal skills, it is time to put it all together and start building your case. This is the critical step that brings together what you have learned so far about legislation, case law, and evidence.

Whether you are appearing in court or completing a court document, you need to be able to make legal arguments. You need to ask the court for something and provide information that supports a favourable decision. To do this, you need to build your case.

To build your case, you need to answer these four questions:

• What do I want?
• What is the law?
• What do I need to prove?
• How am I going to prove it?

What do I want?

Ask yourself: what do I want the judge to decide? You need to be realistic. You may want to keep everything, while the other party gets nothing. But asking for an order that is not supported by law will not be successful. In fact, in some courts, you may be required to pay court costs for bringing unsuccessful claims. A costs claim can be for a lot of money so don’t forget that if you lose you may be ordered to pay costs.

Deciding what you ask for depends on your legal entitlement. A judge can only make an order that follows the law. For instance, a judge will not award you damages for breach of contract if your arrangement does not meet the definition of a contract.

To figure out what to ask for you need to know:

• what the law says about your rights; and
• how the laws relate to the facts of your situation.

You must include what you are asking for (the order you seek) in your pleadings (or initiating court forms). If it is not in there, the judge may not grant you that order. For example, if your application is for property damages to your roof, a judge is unlikely to give you compensation for damages to your fence.

What is the law?

Do your legal research. It is good to know the law that supports your claim. When you make your legal argument, you will want to be able to refer to the specific section of the statutory law (legislation) that gives you the right to what you want, or the cases that have been decided in a way that helps support your case.

What do I need to prove?

This next step is to determine what you need to show that the law applies to your situation. When thinking about what you need to prove, remember, a judge can only make orders that follow the law. To use a silly, but illustrative example, if the law says you are entitled to a free horse only if you have lived on the moon for a year, a judge cannot give you a horse if you have never lived on the moon. If you want a free horse, think how you can prove that you should get one. Break the law down into its elements.

This example shows how you need to work within the legal requirements set out in the law. The best way to do this is by breaking down the law into its legal elements. Once you have figured out what elements you need to prove, you can start thinking about proving them.

How am I going to prove it?

Once you have figured out what you need to prove, you can think about how best to do this. You will need to bring to court evidence to establish the facts. For each claim or element of the claim, you are trying to make, you should have some evidence to prove it. If there is evidence you are missing (e.g. financial statements or an expert appraisal opinion), make note of it and try to obtain it.

You are now ready to complete your own Case Building Worksheet.

 Download the Worksheet

Fill in the columns. Under “What I Want”, state the orders you are asking the judge to make. Under “The Law”, summarize the law you are relying on (legislation and cases). Under “Points to Prove”, apply the law to your situation to find what you need to show the judge. Under “Evidence (the Proof)”, state the evidence you are using to support your points.

For example – What I Want: To be able to sell ice cream on Sundays. The Law: One must hold a permit to sell ice cream on Sundays. Points to Prove: You have a permit to sell ice cream on Sundays. The Proof: The permit.