Searching Cases

Basic Search

Type your query in the search bar — a topic, party name, legal concept, or ECLI identifier. Results show:

• Headline and snippet with highlighted matches
• Court and ruling date
• Emoji summary for quick visual assessment
• Source badge (Case Law, ACM)

Results are paginated at 20 per page.

Filters

Narrow results using the filter drawer:

• Court — select one or more courts (e.g., Hoge Raad, Gerechtshof)
• Date range — filter by year or specific date range
• Sort — relevance (default), newest first, oldest first

Apply or remove filters without re-running your search.

Search Modes

Feitlijn supports three search modes:

• Natural — standard keyword/phrase search (default)
• Boolean — advanced queries with AND, OR, NOT operators
• Expansion — broadens your query with related terms

ECLI Detection

If you type or paste an ECLI identifier (e.g., ECLI:NL:HR:2023:123), Feitlijn recognizes it and takes you directly to that case.

Search Suggestions

As you type, Feitlijn shows real-time suggestions including recent queries and matching cases. Click a suggestion to jump directly to it.

Tips

• Use specific legal terms for better relevance
• Filter by court when you know the jurisdiction
• Sort by date when looking for recent developments
• Use the ECLI Scanner to extract multiple case references from a document at once