⚖️ CourtListener Legal Opinions & Dockets Scraper

Search and extract US Federal, Appellate, and Supreme Court legal opinions, case titles, docket numbers, judges, citations, and summaries directly from CourtListener (Free Law Project).

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🥊 Why This Actor Beats the Competition

Feature	⚡ CourtListener Scraper	🐢 Traditional Legal Search & Westlaw
Speed	30+ case records in < 2 seconds	Expensive, clunky portals with slow page loads
Pricing	$1.50 / 1,000 items (Platform Usage: FREE)	Westlaw/LexisNexis cost thousands per seat/month
LLM-Ready	Clean JSON with markdown-formatted case snippets	Messy PDF scans with OCR artifacts
Court Filters	Filter by Supreme Court (scotus), Circuit courts (ca9)	Complex boolean query syntax required
Anti-Bot Blocking	Zero Captchas / Direct Native REST API	Aggressive bot shields on legal aggregators

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🛠️ Step-by-Step: How to Use

Method 1: Apify Web Console (No-Code GUI)

1. Enter your target Search Query (e.g. fair use copyright, patent infringement, qualified immunity).
2. Optionally enter a Court Identifier (e.g. scotus for US Supreme Court, ca9 for 9th Circuit, cand for Northern District of California).
3. Set Max Items and click Start.
4. Download legal case datasets in JSON, CSV, or feed directly into your Legal LLM pipeline.

Method 2: Python SDK

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN")
run_input = {
    "query": "artificial intelligence copyright",
    "court": "scotus",
    "maxItems": 25
}
run = client.actor("litezero/courtlistener-legal-docket-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(f"{item['caseName']} ({item['court']}) - Docket: {item['docketNumber']}")

Method 3: Node.js SDK

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN' });
const run = await client.actor('litezero/courtlistener-legal-docket-scraper').call({
    query: 'patent eligibility section 101',
    maxItems: 20,
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(`Extracted ${items.length} legal opinions.`);

Method 4: REST API / cURL

curl "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/litezero~courtlistener-legal-docket-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"query": "securities fraud class action", "maxItems": 20}'

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📥 Input Parameters

Field	Type	Default	Description
query	String	"fair use copyright"	Legal keyword, case name, doctrine, or statute to search.
court	String	Optional	Court identifier code (scotus, ca1–ca11, cadc, cafc, cand, sdny).
maxItems	Integer	30	Maximum number of cases / opinions to retrieve.

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📤 Output Data Dictionary

{
  "id": 8941203,
  "caseName": "Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith",
  "docketNumber": "21-869",
  "court": "scotus",
  "courtCitationString": "Supreme Court of the United States",
  "dateFiled": "2023-05-18",
  "judges": "Sotomayor",
  "citation": "598 U.S. 508",
  "snippet": "The commercial nature of the use looms larger in the **fair use** analysis when both the original and secondary works share substantially the same purpose...",
  "courtListenerUrl": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/8941203/andy-warhol-foundation-for-the-visual-arts-inc-v-goldsmith/",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-10-04T10:00:00.000Z"
}

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💡 Top Use Cases

1. Legal LLM & RAG Pipelines: Enrich AI legal copilots with authoritative US case law citations, judicial holdings, and docket timelines.
2. Litigation Due Diligence: Track judicial rulings, circuit court precedents, and litigation trends across federal jurisdictions.
3. Law Firm Knowledge Management: Monitor emerging rulings on IP, corporate securities, and regulatory compliance.