Justice · Supreme Court of California
What applies in this courtroom
40 verified requirements may apply in this courtroom, by layer: 0 published by Justice Goodwin H. Liu · 13 from the court's own rules · 27 statewide — with 29 rule deadlines across those layers. Only the judge's own rules are specific to this courtroom; the other layers apply by court, county and state scope, and a court- or case-specific order can displace them.
The tabs below show the judge-and-division layer only. The Full Premium Report assembles the complete stack — every requirement, deadline table, ruling intelligence, live case-type scan, and source appendix in one cited document.
Your first 7 Judge Intelligence Reports are free with a free account — no payment card required.
Associate Justice — Supreme Court of California
nominated Goodwin Liu, Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley Law School, to the state Supreme Court today.
The appointing authority's record · checked October 20, 2026
This tab lists judge-scoped rules only, and BenchPath has not yet published judge-specific rules for this judge — the courtroom also runs on the court's own rules and the statewide layer: 40 verified requirements may apply here. The Full Premium Report assembles every one of them, cited.
See all 40 in the Full Premium Report →No judge-level deadline on record runs shorter than a statewide deadline with the same trigger. The sentinel compares quoted timing across every published rule scoped to this judge on each visit — a clean result today is re-earned tomorrow.
No judge-scoped deadlines on this tab. Deadlines are extracted only when the source rule text states them — we never infer or calculate dates the rule does not explicitly contain. 29 rule deadlines apply in this courtroom across all layers — assembled with citations in the Full Premium Report.
Timing shown here is quoted from the rule text. Compute your actual date against the court's calendar and the rule itself — not legal advice.
Verbatim passages from opinions this judge authored for the court, quoted from the court's published PDF and hash-verified against it. The note under each quote restates only what the court itself said.
“We conclude that the trial court erred in determining that a retrospective competency hearing was feasible.”
In everyday terms: The court concluded that the trial court erred in finding that a retrospective hearing on the defendant’s competence to stand trial was feasible, emphasizing that such hearings are generally disfavored. With a key expert and other witnesses unavailable and the record limited, the prosecution had not shown that the evidence was sufficient to determine his competence at the earlier trial reliably.
Verbatim excerpt reproduced from the court-published official slip opinion (hash-registered evidence document, sha256 d0e786e2883dd53c...; authorship verified: “Opinion of the Court by Liu, J.”). The plain-language note restates only the reasoning stated in the opinion. Excerpt containment-verified against the slip’s text layer (Phase 6 custody text2/documents/S226760.txt, the PDF’s line breaks read as spaces); the page is the slip’s own, from its running header.
Quotes are reproduced verbatim from the court's published opinion; the plain-language note describes the court's stated reasoning only. Procedural information, not legal advice.
No verified ruling summary yet. BenchPath generates ruling summaries from opinion and docket corpora (CourtListener where covered) and publishes them only after human review — fabricated judicial analytics are exactly what this platform refuses to ship.
The attributed-opinion corpus holds California's appellate opinions as the Judicial Council posts them, from the listings BenchPath has read since October 2026 (each reaches back 120 days for published opinions and 60 for unpublished ones). The First, Third and Sixth Districts' unpublished opinions do not name the trial judge, so a ruling reviewed there is not attributed. Absence here is a coverage statement, never evidence about this judge.
Use the live case-law search below to see what exists for this judge today.
P. v. Lightsey
Supreme Court of California · Opinion
Answer three quick questions. The platform pulls Goodwin H. Liu's full public case-law record from the source, newest first — your matter never narrows the pull; it directs the relevance ranking and the dual-AI analysis. Every hit comes back Bluebook-cited with the opinion's own words quoted verbatim. The scan takes the time precision takes.
Case-law search
CourtListener · free connector · liveCoverage note: CourtListener is strongest for federal courts and state appellate courts. California superior-court opinions are sparsely represented — an absence of results is a coverage gap, not evidence about this judge.
No rule-level sources registered yet — judge-level provenance is listed in the Overview tab.
Research connectors
CourtListener
● liveFree Law Project
Free. Opinions, dockets, RECAP, judge metadata. Powering the case-law search on this page.
Westlaw
○ bring your licenseThomson Reuters
Bring your firm's license — enterprise connector queries your judge and related cases inside Westlaw. Phase 2.
LexisNexis
○ bring your licenseRELX
Bring your firm's license — enterprise connector for Lexis+ research tied to your matter. Phase 2.
BenchPath never scrapes licensed databases. Westlaw and LexisNexis connect only through your firm's own credentials and entitlements when the enterprise connectors ship.
Associate Justice — Supreme Court of Californiacurrent
date not recorded — present
assignment source →No source changes detected for this judge yet — when the underlying court pages move, it shows up here first.