Hurrah for PatternJury Instructions Online!!

Washington State's pattern jury instructions are published by Thomson West as part of Washington Practice. For years they have been available on Westlaw, but until this week there has never been a free source for them. And now there is!

Washington Pattern Jury Instructions -- both civil and criminal -- are now on the Web for free. "This website is maintained by Thomson West under contract with the Washington Supreme Court Committee on Jury Instructions."

The committee says "This free public access is being provided as part of a one-year pilot project between the WPI Committee and Thomson/West Publishing. We hope to be able to continue the free access beyond the one-year period."

This is great news!

Right now, links to the RCW take you to a Westlaw sign-on screen. I'd like to see links go to a free site -- either the legislature's or legalwa.org's .

(Students note: even if you don't need to draft jury instructions, the pattern instructions offer a nice summary of the law.)