This and That in Court Technology – Groundhog Day 2013 Edition

Some news that we have picked up from the court tech world.  And for our international friends, here is a link to information about what Groundhog Day is and even better, the film.

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Using Technology to Enhance Access to Justice

A bunch of our colleagues and friends got together and wrote a paper that has been published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, Volume 26, Number 1: Fall 2012.  John Greacen writes in the introduction:

“This Article comprises six papers prepared for the first session of the (2012 Legal Services Corporation) Summit. Part II of this Article summarizes successful efforts made over the past few years by legal services organizations using the Internet to deliver information and services related to access to justice. Part III discusses barriers to implementing new technologies that enhance access to justice and identifies impediments that new technologies may create for poor or unsophisticated persons. Part IV explains how legal services organizations are taking advantage of mobile technology to enable poor persons to access legal services.  Part V describes current e-filing systems and proposes that open technical standards be used to facilitate development of applications for SRLs. Part VI addresses the potential use of technology to match individual litigants’ needs with the services most appropriate for their cases. Part VII discusses financial, managerial, personal, and ethical impediments to the adoption of automated legal services applications.”

Federal Courts Expands Access to Opinions

By Press Release, January 31, 2013:

"A pilot project giving the public free, text-searchable, online-access to court opinions now is available to all federal appellate, district and bankruptcy courts.

The Judicial Conference, the policy-making body of the Federal court system, approved national implementation of the project with the Government Printing Office, Federal Digital System (FDsys), which provides free access to publications from all three branches of federal government via the Internet. The pilot project pulls opinions nightly from courts’ Case Management/Electronic Case Files (CM/ECF) systems and sends them to the GPO, where they are processed and posted on the FDsys website. The functionality to transfer opinions to FDsys is included in the latest release of CM/ECF which is now available to all courts. Twenty-nine courts participated in the original pilot, and now, all courts may opt to participate in the program.

Access to judicial opinions through FDsys allows the Judiciary to make its work more easily available to the public. Collections are divided into appellate, district or bankruptcy court opinions and are text-searchable across opinions and across courts. FDsys also permits embedded animation and audio.

Presently, more than 600,000 opinions dating back to 2004 are available.

Opinions from the pilot are already one of the most heavily used collections on FDsys, with millions of retrievals each month."

LegalXML Electronic Court Filing Version 4.01 Enters Public Review

On January 30, 2013 it was announced that “members of the OASIS LegalXML Electronic Court Filing TC have recently approved a Special Majority Ballot to advance Electronic Court Filing Version 4.01 as a Candidate OASIS Standard (COS). The COS now enters a 60-day public review period in preparation for a member ballot to consider its approval as an OASIS Standard.”
https://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=legalxml-courtfiling

Early Court App for Mobile

Our good friend, Richard Zorza has posted a note in his blog on a new Apple and Android apps that were developed by the Clark County courts in Las Vegas, Nevada for mobile devices.  Click here to read the post.

Pennsylvania Judiciary Enhances their Website

By press release, January 31, 2013:

“Pennsylvania’s judiciary has launched a new website with a dynamic change in appearance, navigation and overall design. The website address will remain www.pacourts.us.

Enhancements to the new website include redesigned page layouts, improved navigation and organization of various court information areas, and highlighted news of interest to the court community and general public.”

Blog Posts from the Legaltech Show

Finally, for those of you who might not know, one of the largest legal (meaning lawyer) technology shows is the annual Legaltech that is held in New York City each January.  A blog post titled “Legaltech: The Future of Technology: Five Trends Lawyers Can’t Ignore" is an interesting read.  There are links to other posts from the conference as well.