Civil Court Filings -- Recordings of Non-Criminal Activities

By: Amit Mehta
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:23:32
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Civil court filings pertain to documentation for all civil court cases. Civil court cases are roughly defined as all cases that are non-criminal in nature. Civil court records are also those that govern private citizens and are to be distinguished from international law and military law as well.

Civil court filings are those with less than ten thousand dollars involved, while cases that deal with more than this amount are usually tried at the Supreme Court. For those cases with less than five thousand dollars at stake, the magistrate will be the one responsible for deciding if this can be tried at a small claims court. Civil court documents are divided into several groups depending on the different laws that they fall under.

Civil Court Document Categories

Cases dealing with contracts, damage to property and personal injury all fall under general civil court filings. Family civil court records cover those about divorce, child support, child custody and alimony. Juvenile filings are those about juvenile delinquency or individuals committing crimes under the age of 18 as well as juvenile dependency or those cases involving child abuse.

If you are renting or leasing a place, then this will fall under landlord or tenant civil filings. Probate civil court records refer to those cases that deal with personal affairs including adoption, name changes, guardianship, transferring an estate and determining inheritance through a will.

One reason for obtaining civil court filings is for determining whether an individual or a company is involved in any kind of litigation. The civil court filing papers include all the forms that you fill out before you are allowed to file a formal case. This also includes all other documentation that is required for the pre-trial and post-trial as well as the actual trial proceedings. Acquiring civil court filing documents is especially relevant if you want to contest a court decision and need information regarding similar cases that have been decided on in the past.

If you visit the websites of various civil courts, you will be able to request for records online. This is especially convenient if you want to compare how compliant a certain case has been to actual civil court rules and procedures. You can easily search online databases either by name or by the numbers of the civil court filings that you are looking for.

Filings available online are also excellent resources for law students, paralegals and other legal assistants who may not have the time or the means to retrieve the actual public documents. Some websites even offer concise summaries of the cases, which also aid in saving time and effort in getting the needed information.

Getting these records online also gives you the chance to read through the opinions and analyses of lawyers and judges which can be generalized for most civil court cases. Although civil court laws will differ from state to state, there are still some basic tenets and procedures that can be applied for all civil court filings.

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