The article focuses on practical experiment on perception of argumentative nature of court opinions by non-native speakers. Several argumentative frames most frequently used in the texts of court opinions are identified and described in the article. The article also aims at analyzing the distribution characteristics of the identified frames. Text of court opinion not only performs informative and performative functions, but also reflects the socio-pragmatic setup of the author. A definite set of communicative senses is reflected in the respective modus functions forming a specific meta-category of modus in the judicial discourse. The function of this meta-category is to specify facts through the synthesis of the objective (that is, legally justified) and subjective (which include the position of the court, or of the judge) components of argumentative frame.