How to Extract the Core Legal Opinion Text from a Law Paper Using Python?

[f-kaiser]

Body

Hello everyone,

I’m working on a Python script that I would like to use for the automated processing of law papers. Specifically, I need a way to extract only the main body of the legal opinion (the “Gutachten”) from a paper, while removing everything else such as the title page, the problem description (“Sachverhalt”), the table of contents, the bibliography, and the statement of independent work at the end.

In the example I’ve attached, the legal opinion starts on page 11. Can anyone suggest how I could approach this task? Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you in advance!
Beispiel.docx

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[Justagwas]

Hello, seeing as no one's answered yet I thought I'd try. Although I'm not well versed in German, so I do not partially understand or find the part which you need to extract I think my suggestions will still fit your request.

For extracting the main body of the legal opinion from a .docx file specifically, here's a simple approach:

1. You can use python-docx. This library allows you to read and process Microsoft Word files. You can install it via cmd - pip install python-docx. Here's the documentation for python-docx.

2. If you’re processing documents in bulk, you can later scale this up, but I recommend starting with a single document for simplicity.

3. After loading the .docx file with python-docx, iterate through the words to find the keyword “Gutachten” or another indicator marking the start of the main body.

4. Once you find the "Gutachten" or some other indication, start appending the following paragraphs, sentences, words to a .txt file. Continue appending text until you encounter a new section (e.g., another heading, the bibliography, etc.) that signals the end of the main body.

[f-kaiser]

Thank you so much for your suggestion! Your approach worked perfectly, I did have to make a slight adjustment, though – I had to start the extraction process only after the word “Gutachten” appeared for the second time, as it initially appears in the table of contents.

really appreciate the guidance!