In court, an unfamiliar point can arise without warning, leaving little time to find the right authority.
Kevin Leigh has faced that pressure throughout four decades at the Bar. During a recent High Court hearing, it surfaced again while opposing counsel was still on their feet.
Rather than waiting until the hearing ended, he opened Lexis+ with Protégé. “I looked something up while the judge was talking to my opponent,” he recalled, “then I could get to my feet and say to the judge, ‘There is a case on this point. Let me take you to it’”.
As the discussion developed, Leigh could see the authority changing the trajectory of the case. “The judge, I could see, had taken the points from the authority that I’d given him to deal with a point the other side made, which I thought was wrong”, he recalled. Alongside other materials, the authority helped the court distil the point until, in Leigh’s words, “the other side couldn’t really oppose”.
“You feel ten foot tall when it goes well.”
Watch the 1 minute video case study to learn more
Building the legal argument before stepping into court
Before hearings, Leigh uses Lexis+ with Protégé to research both familiar and unfamiliar points of law. He explained that when conducting legal research:
“The important thing is not knowing everything, it's knowing where to find the answers, and without Protégé, it is much harder to find those answers.”
Protégé’s ability to get to the right starting point faster has changed his research process. "It accelerates a more thorough level of legal research," he said. "You really do get an answer to the question, which you can then sift through."
Finding a potentially relevant authority is only the first step. Leigh’s next task is deciding whether the point can withstand scrutiny in the argument he’s building.
Checking the legal authority behind the answer
Once Protégé surfaces an answer, Leigh follows the linked citations into the underlying case law or legislation, grounded in LexisNexis’ trusted legal content. He described how this step became especially valuable during a case that involved a Human Rights Convention argument that was outside his usual area of practice:
“Protégé threw up the references to a panoply of case law. I then spent some time going through to work out the single case that I wanted.”
Here, AI becomes part of, rather than replaces, legal expertise. Protégé helps him reach the relevant authorities efficiently and thoroughly, but he still reads the cases, considers how closely they fit the facts and then takes time to decide whether they genuinely support the point he wants to make.
Once Leigh is satisfied that the authority supports the point, he shifts to presenting it clearly and persuasively.
Another pair of eyes on written advocacy
At this point in the workflow, Leigh uses Lexis+ with Protégé to review skeleton arguments, pleadings, letters and submissions before they are finalised. Even after decades at the Bar, he values the discipline of having his work challenged:
“Protégé takes what you’ve got, often removes unnecessary repetition, and sometimes recasts it in a way that it becomes clearer to understand and therefore, hopefully, more persuasive.”
Leigh also believes that the value of Protégé’s review carries from one case to the next. As it reviews and refines his drafts, he learns from the changes and applies them to his own writing.
“What I’ve noticed is that it’s improving my ability to draft. I now think much more carefully about how I’m drafting because I’m actually learning from Protégé.”
Seeing how the language and structure can be strengthened gives him something to carry forward. As he put it, “I can learn from that. I can improve and refine”.
Confidence clients can see
By the time Leigh stands to address the court, Lexis+ with Protégé has already helped him reach the relevant authority, test it against the source and present the point clearly. As he said, “I’m doing much better for clients”.
Regular use of the platform in his research and preparation means he is comfortable turning to it when the pressure is on. That familiarity proved valuable during the High Court hearing. Leigh was able to respond while the issue was still live, take the judge to the authority and argue the point with confidence. He believed the client could see that too: “The client thought, ‘This guy knows what he’s doing’”.
For Leigh, this is where the value of Protégé becomes most tangible. It strengthens his confidence in the work and gives clients greater confidence in the advocate standing up for them.
Get a quote for Lexis+ with Protégé
* denotes a required field
