Some law reports also indicate whether a reported case has a commonly used short title. The full-text court decision of R. v. Barr can be found in Volume 16 of the Second Series of the Manitoba Reports at page 1. You will soon start to recognize frequently cited case reporters and other common abbreviations. The McGill Guide also lists commonly used abbreviations in its appendices. It is important to identify the series of the case reporter in which a decision has been published.
Many law reports are now in their second, third, or fourth series.
A new series of a reporter is begun when, in the opinion of the publisher, the existing series becomes too voluminous. In the annual volume system, volumes are identified by the year in which they were published. The Supreme Court Reports , which publishes decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada, employs this system. Note that the comma goes immediately after the style of cause, and that the date appears in square brackets. Increasingly, report series employing the annual volume system are publishing more than one volume per year.