Verified Authorities
An AI-suggested case that doesn't exist — or one that was overruled years ago — is worse than no case at all. Case Strategy treats citations as claims to be checked, not trusted: every authority in the report is verified against the source archive before you see it, and its subsequent treatment by later courts is mapped. This page explains the badges that carry those results and how to act on each one.
How verification works
After the report is built, Judicio takes every authority the strategy relies on and looks its reporter citation up in the public citator for that jurisdiction (Indian Kanoon for Indian matters, CourtListener for US, and so on). The check confirms two things: that the citation resolves to a real judgment, and that the case name on that judgment agrees with the one the report gives. The outcome lands on the authority as a trust badge.
Separately, the passage the report retrieved for each authority is checked against what the report says it holds, and any pinpoint paragraph the report cites is checked for whether that paragraph number appears in the retrieved passage at all. A pinpoint that cannot be located is withheld rather than shown.
What this does not do is read the full judgment. Nothing here confirms that a paragraph says what the report says it says — only that the citation is real, the name matches, and the retrieved passage supports the summary.
The three trust badges
| Badge | What it means | How to treat it |
|---|---|---|
| Verified | The citation resolved in the public citator and the case name matches. | A good signal that the authority is real and correctly named — not that it says what the report says. Read the key ones yourself before the hearing. |
| Citation mismatch | The citation resolved, but to a judgment whose case name doesn't match the one cited. | Treat the authority as unconfirmed. Pull the official report and check both the citation and the proposition before citing it in court. |
| Not found | The citation could not be resolved — no citator covers this jurisdiction, or the lookup failed. The authority may still be real; it simply wasn't checked. | Verify manually before relying on it. If you can't source it, don't cite it. |
Hover any non-verified badge to read the exact note — what was found, what didn't match, and what to check.
Where the badges surface
The badges follow the authority everywhere it appears: the authorities section of the memo, the inline citation-chip popovers, the ground cards' "Check cites" caution dot in the rail, the caution stat pill in the session header, and the courtroom rail in Moot Court. A report with "10 verified · 2 caution" is telling you exactly two citations need a manual check — and where they are.
Treatment badges — is it still good law?
A verified citation can still sink you if later courts have moved on. Where the archive shows subsequent treatment, the authority carries a second badge:
| Badge | What it means | How to treat it |
|---|---|---|
| Followed | Later decisions apply the holding — it's the governing line. | Cite with confidence; note the follow-on cases for depth. |
| Distinguished | Later courts have confined it to its facts. | Expect the other side to distinguish it too — read how it was distinguished and pre-empt that in your argument. |
| Overruled | A later decision has overturned the holding. | Don't lead with it. If it appears, it's usually as the other side's authority — and your answer. |
| Superseded | The legislature has displaced the ratio (for example, an amendment act reversing a jurisdictional holding). | Cite the current statutory position; keep the case only to pre-empt an objection built on it. |
Hover a treatment badge for the note explaining the treatment — which later case followed or distinguished it, or which amendment superseded it.
Opposing authorities carry the same verification and treatment checks, plus a "how to distinguish" note — why that case does not govern your facts. When opposing counsel cites it in the moot (or the hearing), the distinction is already drafted.
Supporting vs opposing authorities
Every authority is also marked For you or Against you. The report doesn't hide adverse authority — it surfaces the other side's best cases deliberately, each with its distinguish note, because the worst place to meet a bad case is in the courtroom.
The evidence pack
When you export the report, you can include:
- Authorities appendix — every cited authority with its citation, holding summary, pinpoint paragraphs, and verification status, appended to the report PDF/Word.
- Evidence pack — archived copies of the cited pages, merged into a single PDF. Judicio fetches and archives each cited page on request (as a PDF/A), so what you cite travels with the report instead of relying on a link that may move. Pages that cannot be reached — even via the Wayback fallback — are reported rather than silently omitted.
See Exporting & Drafting for the export flow.
The badges tell you what was checked and what wasn't — they don't replace reading the law. Read every authority you intend to stand up and cite, starting with anything marked mismatch or not found.
Next steps
- Understanding the Report — where the badges sit in the report workspace.
- Moot Court — the courtroom rail tracks which authorities each side has invoked, live.
- FAQ — common questions about verification coverage and jurisdictions.