How to Find Case Law in Prism: Cassation Decisions and Supreme Court Holdings

Choose Prism as the main workspace for cassation research: the legal question, decisions, and your documents become a working table and follow-up actions. Use a payment dispute involving services performed and an unsigned acceptance record to move from finding a Supreme Court holding to comparing it with the matter’s material.

1. Describe the question and facts

Tell Prism the agreement type, work performed, acceptance and payment terms, available documents, and the customer’s objection. Attach the agreement, record, and correspondence.

Start with: “Which circumstances does the Supreme Court examine when services were performed but the record remains unsigned?” Try terms such as “unsigned acceptance records,” “services actually provided,” and “payment for work performed.”

2. Search the relevant cassation jurisdiction

In the Unified State Register of Court Decisions, select the cassation instance and the decision form “Постанова”. For a commercial dispute, begin with the Cassation Commercial Court within the Supreme Court; use the corresponding cassation court for another jurisdiction.

Separately check relevant Grand Chamber, joint-chamber, and chamber decisions. Use the Supreme Court holdings database to search by provision and legal conclusion, and the official case-law reviews to navigate a subject.

3. Give Prism a defined task

Find Supreme Court cassation decisions about payment for services performed where an acceptance record was not signed. Start with commercial jurisdiction. Identify relevant Grand Chamber, joint-chamber, and chamber holdings. For each decision, give the case, date, court composition, provision, exact paragraph, similar and different circumstances, and source link. Separately check subsequent decisions and possible departures from the holding.

Review the plan for cassation searches and a check of the holding’s current treatment. Open the output in the Report panel.

4. Open the complete decision

A real example is the chamber decision dated 4 September 2023 in case 910/5352/21, also register document 113292784.

Paragraph 91 describes the referral question concerning a possible departure. Paragraph 92 states that the chamber found no grounds to depart in this instance. Check the outcome of that question, rather than treating a mention of departure as its result.

5. Keep a working table

Prism’s advantage for this task is continuing the search with your own agreement and retaining the path to the working conclusion. Export the table and retain it with its sources in the project. Ask next: “Compare this holding with our agreement and identify the facts to support.” Begin with Prism research.