Appellate Practice Tools and Resources

Administrative Personnel

(including Appellate Panel Support Unit personnel and contact information)

Administrative Resources

(including CAFL trial and appellate performance standards, mentor/mentee information, billing, certification and forms)

Appellate Packet for Trial Attorneys

(including blank notice of appeal, motions for appointment of appellate counsel and for fees and costs, intake forms, and CAFL’s appellate guide for trial attorneys)

Appellate Practice – Single Justice

(including CAFL’s single justice practice handbook, relevant statutes & court rules, model petitions & memoranda of law, single justice model motions, and important single justice links)

Appellate Practice – General

Cases, Case Summaries, and Legal Research Memos

(including our “Compendium of Unpublished Decisions,” due process issue/resource bank, and other legal research memos on tons of topics)

Clinical Research Bank

(including research memos on trauma from removal, sibling placement/visitation, post-adoption contact, the benefits of kinship placement, outcomes for “legal orphans,” and many other topics)

E-Filing (everything you need to know!)

Model Briefs

(including model appellant/appellee briefs, reply briefs, FAR applications, DAR applications, and post-argument letters)

Model Motions

(including motions to file late notice of appeal, motions regarding late docketing, motions for enlargement, status reports, and many others)

Oral Arguments

(including links to SJC and Appeals Court oral arguments and the Suffolk Law School oral argument archive)

Statutes, Court Rules & DCF Regulations/Policies

(including key state and federal statutes, Rules of Appellate Procedure, Appeals Court Rules, Trial Court Rules, and Trial Court Standing Orders)