Practical knowledge management in the legal domain

Knowledge is an important factor in the application of the law. It is impossible to apply the law correctly without consulting the correct information or without having the right knowledge. This paper identifies three important areas of knowledge in the legal domain (legislation, jurisprudence, and sentencing) and presents the processes involved in the creation and use of knowledge in those areas. A computer mediation system is used as the vehicle for accessing and applying the knowledge. Information Entities are the basic form of information, and together with Case Scripts form a legal ontology. The information is stored in XML files, except for the cases themselves, that for performance reasons are kept in a relational database. The system was designed to facilitate the task of managing the knowledge it contains, and to allow the integration of other sub-systems that increase its functionality.