FYI Re: Mississippi E-Filing

I received this press release via email last Friday regarding the Mississippi Judiciary’s recent successful feasibility study to adapt the federal CM/ECF e-filing system for state court use. Note the advantages of an internally developed and court-operated e-filing environment that the Functional Evaluation Team cited in its April 2008 report.

Mississippi court system evaluates federal case management and e-filing

July 11, 2008

The Mississippi state court system is evaluating the federal court Case Management and Electronic Filing System (CM/ECF) for possible use in state courts.

It is hoped that this project will lead to development of an electronic case management and electronic filing system which can be made available to all the chancery and circuit courts in the state. Such a system would allow attorneys to file their pleadings and retrieve documents via the Internet, give courts an efficient tool for docket management, and make court records more accessible to the public.

Clerks and staff of the Madison County Chancery and Circuit Clerks completed four months of testing in early 2008 and determined that it could be adapted for state court use. The first testing was done with Madison County Chancery Court records in closed cases. Chancery Court was chosen as a starting point, since chancery documents are very different from anything which would be filed in a federal court.

The testing with actual cases is the latest step in a careful and deliberate study. In 2004, under the leadership of Presiding Justice William L. Waller Jr., the Supreme Court formed a task force which conducted a statewide needs analysis and adopted policy standards for a uniform statewide system to be offered to the individual courts and clerk’s offices. The Supreme Court with the assistance of a task force representing a cross-section of interested individuals and offices began work in 2005 to develop strategic goals and policy standards. In 2006, the Mississippi Legislature established a Comprehensive Electronic Court System Fund for this development with a fee of $10 assessed on all new civil case filings. The court has also utilized federal grant funding for the project.

The Supreme Court in May 2007 entered an agreement with the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts to study the feasibility of adapting the federal trial court case management and electronic filing system and the related PACER public access system for use in state courts. The Supreme Court of Mississippi CM/ECF Functional Evaluation Team in an April 10, 2008, report presented functional standards for the Mississippi system and recommended a pilot project to continue testing and evaluating the federal court system for modification to fit state court needs. Mississippi Supreme Court Chief Justice James W. Smith Jr. in an order signed April 10, 2008, approved the pilot project in Madison Chancery and Circuit Courts and testing in courts in Scott and Warren counties in the future. Later this year, work is expected to begin on software modifications.

Mississippi is the first state to pursue testing of the federal system for adaptation. Several other states have expressed interest.

Chief Justice Smith said that adapting the federal courts’ system for use in state courts can potentially save millions of dollars in technology development costs and give the state courts access to a system which has been proven to work and with which most attorneys are already familiar.

Chief Justice Smith said having a unified system with computerized records filing will make records more accessible to litigants, lawyers, law enforcement and the public, and will provide a backup system for records storage and retrieval in the event of a catastrophe.

The Functional Evaluation Team in its April 2008 report echoed those and other benefits. The report cited these advantages:

• Attorneys who practice in federal court are already familiar with the system.

• The system is browser based without a steep learning curve for new users.

• CM/ECF is not vendor-developed, putting the state in a better position to drive functionality and development decisions.

• Changes can be made by system users without assistance of application developers.

• The system is scalable, proven and secure.

• The system is flexible to accommodate preferences among different courts.

• The standard platform for electronic filing allows seamless transfer of data between courts.

• The system facilitates processing paperwork for appeals.

• The system enhances access to and portability of court documents.

• Access could be made available from any location with Internet connectivity without special hardware, software or connectivity.

• The system can standardize statistical reporting.

• The cost of acquiring the system is low.

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