When court cases are cited I often see a series of numbers and letters after the name of the case. For instance in this case that you cited you put "146 Wn.2d 166, 173-75, 43 P.3d 513".
Please excuse my ignorance but I have never really understood what it all means. Could you explain it to me and others so we can have a better understanding of what we are looking at when we see court cites in the future. It would also help me to be more accurate/proper when I cite cases myself. Is the year that is included the year the case was filed or the year of the decision?
Thanks
Edit: fix typo
No worries, after 24 years it still sometimes looks like Greek to me. Washington has two official reports for court decisions, the Washington Reports (Wn., Wn.2d) for the Supreme Court and the Washington Appellate Reports (Wn.App.) for the Court of Appeals. After the original series hit 200 volumes, they started the 2nd series for the Washington Reports. The Appellate Reports will probably do that eventually as well - - it's currently somewhere in the 150s. In addition to the official publications, Washington decisions can also be found in West Publishing's Pacific Reporter which includes decisions from 15 states (Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Kansas, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming). The practice here has long been to include both the official citation and the West citation.
The example above, State v. Duncan, 146 Wn.2d 166, 173-75, 43 P.3d 513 (2002), translates as follows:
Volume 146, Washington Reports, 2nd Series, Page 166, relevant language found at pages 173 through 175, also found in Volume 43, West's Pacific Reporter, 3rd Series, Page 513 (decided in 2002).
It can be even more confusing when you look at US Supreme Court citations as there are three sources: the official reporter (U.S.), the West Supreme Court Reporter (S.Ct.) and the Lawyer's Edition (L.Ed., L.Ed.2d) by the Lawyer's Cooperative Publishing Company. Almost all citations to US Supreme Court cases will include all three citiations. For example, included in the Duncan opinion is a citation to the Terry case, which is: Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968).
Hope this helps without digging too deep into the weeds. The second paragraph actually has the short answer to your question without the history lesson. If it's too much, that'll teach you to ask a lawyer a question.
