I am wanting to sue my local city in circuit court and I can not afford a lawyer. How can I research and prepare a case for myself ?

Jennie Ellis that's helpful. Cities are sued all the time, and depending on how your locality is set up there is probably a general council office that deals with various lawsuits filed from police misconduct to ADA non-compliance. However, from my quick Googly-eyed search there may be certain particular ways to go about this which getting legal council is strongly advised. There are attorney's offices that take a portion of the settlement that won't cost you too much in up front costs. Depending on what the matter is and what state and jurisdiction it is in there may be a statute of limitations so you may have to find a lawyer anyway.

Now if time is not a factor, and this is strictly a research topic, I'd recommend just going to your local court house and asking in the civil section (not the criminal part) as nicely as possible, about how to find court cases against the particular city department you are interested in. This is probably a whole lot cheaper than the most efficient manner of looking on Lexis/Nexis. Also reach out to you local librarian who could point you to free resources or databases the local library is subscribed to. Maybe they have a court-lawsuit kind of subscription.