Citations

Parse, verify, and retrieve legal citations

Legal citations must be verified before use. This page covers all citation-related endpoints: parsing citations from text, extracting them from documents, verifying they exist, and retrieving full content.

Verify citations

Check if a citation refers to a real case. Essential for catching AI hallucinations.

Endpoint

POST /legal/v1/verify

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/verify \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "text": "The Court held in Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000)..."
  }'

Response

{
  "summary": {
    "total": 1,
    "verified": 1,
    "notFound": 0,
    "multipleMatches": 0
  },
  "citations": [
    {
      "original": "531 U.S. 98",
      "span": { "start": 32, "end": 43 },
      "status": "verified",
      "verificationSource": "courtlistener",
      "confidence": 1,
      "normalized": "531 U.S. 98",
      "case": {
        "id": 118365,
        "name": "Bush v. Gore",
        "shortName": "Bush",
        "court": "scotus",
        "dateDecided": "2000-12-12",
        "parallelCitations": ["121 S. Ct. 525", "148 L. Ed. 2d 388"],
        "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/118365/bush-v-gore/"
      }
    }
  ]
}

Verification statuses

Status	Meaning
verified	Citation matches a real case in CourtListener (~10M cases)
not_found	No match found — likely hallucination or typo
multiple_matches	Multiple possible matches — review candidates array

Each citation also includes verificationSource and confidence. CourtListener returns confidence: 1.0, while heuristic fallback uses a score based on the source verification signals.

---

Parse citations from text

Extract and parse Bluebook components from citation text. Use when you have text and need structured citation data.

Endpoint

POST /legal/v1/citations

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/citations \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{}'

Response

{
  "citations": [
    {
      "original": "410 U.S. 113",
      "span": { "start": 17, "end": 29 },
      "components": {
        "caseName": "Roe v. Wade",
        "volume": 410,
        "reporter": "U.S.",
        "page": 113,
        "year": 1973,
        "court": "scotus"
      },
      "normalized": "410 U.S. 113",
      "found": true
    }
  ]
}

---

Extract citations from URL

Fetch a document and extract all citations from it. Use when you have a URL and want to analyze what it cites.

Endpoint

POST /legal/v1/citations-from-url

Key difference from citations: This endpoint fetches content from a URL and categorizes citations by type (cases, statutes, regulations). The citations endpoint parses text you provide and returns Bluebook components.

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/citations-from-url \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{}'

Response

{
  "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/118365/bush-v-gore/",
  "title": "Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000)",
  "totalCitations": 15,
  "citations": {
    "cases": [
      { "type": "usReporter", "citation": "478 U.S. 109", "count": 3 },
      { "type": "federalReporter", "citation": "772 F.2d 1444", "count": 1 }
    ],
    "statutes": [
      { "type": "usc", "citation": "3 U.S.C. § 5", "count": 2 }
    ],
    "regulations": []
  },
  "externalLinks": ["https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/3/5"]
}

Citation types

Type	Description	Example
usReporter	US Supreme Court	531 U.S. 98
federalReporter	Federal Circuit Courts	123 F.3d 456
stateReporter	State Courts	123 Cal.App.4th 456
usc	US Code	42 U.S.C. § 1983
cfr	Code of Federal Regulations	29 C.F.R. § 1910.134

---

Get full text

Retrieve the full content of a legal document with optional highlights and summary.

Endpoint

POST /legal/v1/full-text

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/full-text \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{}'

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
url	string	URL of the legal document
maxCharacters	number	Max characters to return (1,000-50,000, default 10,000)
highlightQuery	string	Query to highlight relevant passages
summaryQuery	string	Query to generate a focused summary

---

Resolve jurisdictions

Convert jurisdiction names to IDs for filtering searches and verification.

Endpoint

POST /legal/v1/jurisdictions

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/jurisdictions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{}'

Available jurisdictions

ID	Name	Level
us-federal	US Federal	Federal
us-scotus	US Supreme Court	Federal
california	California	State
new-york	New York	State
texas	Texas	State
…	All 50 states	State

---

Common patterns

Verify AI output before display

cURL

# Verify the AI-generated text
curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/verify \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "text": "AI generated citation text..."
  }'

# If not found, search for a real alternative
curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/find \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "query": "extracted topic from text"
  }'

Build a citation checker

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/citations-from-url \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{}'

Get full context for a verified citation

cURL

# Verify the citation
curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/verify \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "text": "531 U.S. 98"
  }'

# If verified, get full text with highlights
curl -X POST https://api.case.dev/legal/v1/full-text \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CASEDEV_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/118365/bush-v-gore/",
    "highlightQuery": "holding"
  }'