Family Law Attorney References Used by Sacramento Family Court News - Newsroom Law Library Tour

Family Law Reporting Sources,  References & Newsroom Law Library

Family law references used by Sacramento Family Court News are the same as those 
used by judges and family law attorneys, including California Practice Guide: Family Law.

Thank you for visiting Sacramento Family Court News, a news website featuring independent reporting about family court, judges, attorneys, pro pers, family law, divorce, child support, child custody and more. To learn more about us, please visit our About Page. This post describes the legal references we use in our reporting.

Family law is complex. Family court cases often involve conflicting he said/she said testimony, or "both sides do it" moral equivalency arguments. Sorting out the facts is a daunting challenge and one reason why most mainstream media avoid reporting on family court issues. 

But almost all family law and procedure is codified or otherwise established by court rules and decisional law, and not subject to reasonable dispute. The news, analysis, and opinion content at Sacramento Family Court News is in large part based on the family law and court procedure references used by judges and attorneys. 

When issuing orders, rulings, and decisions, superior court, Court of Appeal and California Supreme Court judges and justices often rely on and cite legal references published by The Rutter Group. For example, a search for the phrase "Rutter Group" in published and unpublished California decisional law returns 3,270 results. Click here to see the Google Scholar case law search results. 

The Rutter Group publishes Practice Guides for virtually every area of law. "The judges and attorneys who write the Practice Guides are among the best in the nation," according to Rutter. 


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Family law is complex. When they need help, Sacramento Family Court judges
and attorneys turn to California Practice Guide: Family Law and other legal
 treatises published by The Rutter Group.

In Sacramento Family Court the Hon. Matthew J. Gary provides Sacramento County Bar Association Family Law Section attorneys with monthly "Bench Tips" using the California Practice Guide: Family Law treatise. 

Judge Gary provides his monthly tips in The Family Law Counselor, a newsletter for Sacramento County Bar Association family law lawyers. Click here to see more examples of Judge Gary's Bench Tips. 

Family Law & Civil Law References

In our coverage of family court issues, we often use California Practice Guide: Family Law, and other legal references from the SFCN newsroom law library. In our coverage of Court of Appeal and California Supreme Court issues we often use California Practice Guide: Civil Appeals and Writs, and other treatises. 

We also utilize California Practice Guide: Civil Procedure Before Trial, California Practice Guide: Civil Trials and Evidence, and the Witkin Library publications California Procedure 5th Edition, Summary of California Law 10th Edition, and California Evidence 5th Edition. 
   

Federal Law References 

In reporting on issues involving federal courts and law, including the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California and the United States Courts for the Ninth Circuit, we often use California Practice Guide: Federal Civil Procedure Before Trial, and Federal Civil Trials and Evidence. 

Attorney Ethics and Professional Responsibility References

For legal authority on attorney ethics, an excellent treatise is California Practice Guide: Professional Responsibility. We often reference the Professional Responsibility practice guide when reporting on attorney conduct. We also use the State Bar of California Rules of Professional Conduct, the State Bar Act, and the California Compendium on Professional Responsibility. 

The SFCN attorney misconduct page contains news you can use about the California laws that apply to attorneys in the common family court situations we report on. The pages includes links to decisions of the State Bar Court, excerpts from the Compendium on Professional Responsibility, and statutory law applicable to attorney conduct. Click here to go to the SFCN attorney misconduct page.  

Judicial Conduct References

The California Judicial Conduct Handbook
is considered the gold standard reference
on judicial ethics and standards.

In reporting about family court judges, commissioners, referees, and temporary judges, we use several references, including  the gold standard for judicial ethics, California Judicial Conduct Handbook, by David M. Rothman and published by the California Judges Association. 

We also use CJA Ethics Opinions and Judicial Ethics Updates, the California Code of Judicial Ethics [pdf], and formal opinions from the California Supreme Court Committee on Judicial Ethics Opinions.

The Rutter Group California Practice Guides Civil Trials and Evidence, Professional Responsibility, Alternative Dispute Resolution, and Family Law each contain sections about the legal and ethical standards for judges, commissioners, referees and temporary judges.

The primary government authority on judge misconduct is the Commission on Judicial Performance, the state agency responsible for judge oversight and discipline. CJP makes available all public judge discipline decisions since 1961 at this webpage. CJP Annual Reports include comprehensive information on the Commission's authority and procedures, and contain statistical data on Commission cases and summaries of disciplinary actions. Click here for the CJP Annual Reports webpage. 

Sacramento Family Court News indexes CJP disciplinary decisions by type of discipline and other criteria. For example:

• Prejudgment of a case or issue by a judge is prohibited by the Code of Judicial Ethics. For our compilation of CJP disciplinary decisions involving prejudgment, click here.
• Discouraging or obstructing an appeal from a trial court judgment or ruling is a violation of the Code. Click here for our compilation on this subject.
• Abandoning the judicial role and acting as an advocate for a party or attorney is prohibited by the Code. For our compilation, click here.   

Tani Gorre Cantil-Sakauye Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court was a judge in Sacramento County Superior Court from 1997-2005, and established and presided over the first court in Sacramento dedicated solely to domestic violence issues. From 2005–2010 Cantil-Sakauye was a justice on the 3^rd District Court of Appeal in Sacramento.