Appellate Brief
The Appellate Brief project that you will be working on is based upon the fact pattern in the Lesson 05 discussion question. This problem centers around the law of agency which we do not study as a class until Lesson 14, the week your final paper will be due. For this project, you will draft an appellate brief to the State of Florida appellate court. In this brief, you will present the issue(s) to be resolved in this fact pattern. You will conduct legal research utilizing the tools provided in the Lesson 05 video (How To Do Free Internet Legal Research). You will read and apply the law that you find into a discussion/argument answering the issues raised in the fact pattern. While you are welcome to proceed at your own pace, certain benchmarks have been provided throughout the course of the semester to keep you on track to providing a fully written and edit final paper in a timely fashion. As such, your first step after re-reading the fact pattern is to review your fellow students Lesson 05 discussion posts to formulate the issue(s) to discuss in your paper. STEP 1: Run a Google search to find the Wikipedia (or any other secondary source) definition of an employee and independent contractor – Lesson 06 STEP 2: Run a Google search to find the Wikipedia (or any other secondary source) definition of the term vicarious liability. Next, determine what it means for an agent “to act within the scope of their employment” – Lesson 08 STEP 3: Conduct your legal research. Find several supporting cases, statutes or administrative regulations that may help support your clients position and submit – Lesson 10 For all students whose last names start with A-M, you will take the side of the appellant (Chemco). For all students whose last names start with N-Z, you will take the side of the appellate (Matthews). STEP 4: Draft outline to your arguments, cover page, issue(s) to be presented on appeal and statement of facts. View the following attachment for an example of sample brief sample brief – Alternative Formats . Remember, however, that your Court is sitting in Florida. – Lesson 11 STEP 5: Draft the argument section of your paper. Here you are utilizing the research you have found to fully answer the issues on appeal – Lesson 12 Appellate Brief Rubric (100 pts): 15 pts – Grammar/ Punctuation and Spelling 15 pts – APA Formatting and References 70 pts – Content Knowledge There is a maximum limit of 20 pages. There is no required minimum; h owever, as the “Argument Section” provides the content knowledge in this exercise, it is important to provide full arguments and answer(s) to the question(s) presented. Better papers have been those in the range of 7-10 pages, although sufficient arguments have between presented in less than 7 or more than 10 pages. Please be free to contact me at (561)231-3719 or email me at [email protected]. NO PLAGIARISM!
