Tuesday, October 13, 2009

OASIS LegalXML Offers E-Filing Technical Assistance

The OASIS LegalXML Electronic Court Filing ECF Technical Committee has some limited free yes, free! technical assistance available for courts and vendors interested in implementing electronic filing.  The goal of the LegalXML ECF is to create XML based message standards for the transmission of legal documents with the courts; and the latest ECF 4.0 specification is fully conformant with the NIEM and web services standards.

To read more about the work of the ECF go to their webpage at:

http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=legalxml-courtfiling

To request technical assistance you may contact Jim Cabral at: JCabral@mtgmc.com

Monday, October 12, 2009

NCSC E-Filing Survey Results Posted

The results of the 2009 National Center for State Courts electronic court filing survey have been posted online.

The website contains an interactive Google Map that shows the locations of courts who responded to the survey with links to their answers.  The survey is the most comprehensive to date and contains more than 100 courts and court systems.

Some interesting survey results were found.  Among the results it was found that funding and IT staff resources are seen as the most significant barrier to E-filing implementation.  Since E-filing must be integrated into the courts case and document management workflow, the time and effort to do this has been difficult for courts to absorb in these difficult financial times.  But the survey also found that once E-filing has been implemented in the courts, it works. Courts responded that 100 percent of various case types have been E-filed successfully.

Another significant finding is that while courts have not transitioned to electronic format as their official record, many are in transition.  And while courts are continuing to required clerk review of all electronically submitted documents, half are allowing case initiation via E-filing.

Other findings include:
  • Service of Process still being done by physical mail
  • Redaction of sensitive information by the courts is mixed
  • Sealed documents are submitted primarily in hard copy
  • Evidence is submitted both electronically and hard copy
  • E-filed documents are not available online
  • PDF is by far the most popular document type filed
  • If XML is used by the E-filing system, it is the LegalXML 1.x version