Franklin County Court Pleadings Go On-Line!
Franklin County Common Pleas Court has finally joined the courts of other large Ohio counties, and more than a few smaller counties (including Delaware County), by making pleadings FILED on or after December 1, 2006 available on-line in PDF form. The key here is FILED,
In new cases filed on or after December 1, 2009, ALL pleadings will be available on-line. Incases already pending on December 1, 2009, pleadings already filed will not be available on-line, although dockets showing their filing will continue to be available just as they have been, However, NEW pleadings filed in these older case WILL BE available on-line as they are filed,
Pleadings filed in Tenth Appellate District/Franklin County Court of Appeals on or after December 1, 2009 will aso be available on-line according to news reports in Business First. Judges of the juvenile, domestic, and probate divisions of Franklin County Common Pleas Court have elected not to make records in those cases available on-line - probably a good thing given the nature of those sorts of cases. There are also plans to go back and add pleadings already filed to those on-line.
No additional software or passwords are necessary. Nor is there any additional charge to view pleadings. Once on the Franklin County Common Pleas Clerk of Court's website, cases may be searched just as they have been. When the desired case is located and the docket sheet displayed, a PDF icon will appear to the right of those pleadings available on-line. Click the icon to view the pleading which can then be downloaded and/or printed,
Cuyahoga County (Cleveland), Hamilton County (Cincinnati), and Montgomery County (Dayton) have already had pleadings available on-line for quite a while. In fact, Montgomery County intends to begin requiring electronic filing of pleadings in 2010; this may be available in Franklin County sometime in 2011.
It's amazing how happy small things ike this can make me.
