PACER

PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic Records) is a web based case information retrieval system designed by the United States Courts. Most courts offer Internet public access through the PACER Service Center, the judiciary's centralized registration, billing, and technical support center. Access is available to court records for U.S. District, Bankruptcy, Appellate Courts and the U.S. Party/Case Index by registering with the PACER Service Center. Each court maintains a separate database with detailed case information for electronic access. Accessing and querying information from each service is comparable; however, each jurisdiction has a different URL. The format and content differ slightly.

Information Available

The PACER System for the District of South Carolina offers electronic access to case dockets to retrieve information such as:

• A listing of all parties and participants including judges and attorneys
• A chronology of dates of case events entered in the case record
• A compilation of case related information such as cause of action, nature of suit, and dollars demanded for each case
• Judgments or case status
• Cases retrieved by party name, case number, or filing date

The following information is also available at the District of South Carolina's web site.

• Civil and Criminal Local Rules
• Jury Selection Calendar
• Application for Admission to Practice in Federal Court
• Mediator Application
• Mediator Initiation Form

Availability

The PACER System is available around the clock seven days a week. Users can verify all updates to active and recently closed cases without having to make repeated trips to the court to review paper records. If there have been no updates, this can be confirmed in seconds.

U.S. Party/Case Index

The U.S. Party/Case Index is a national index for U.S. District, Bankruptcy and Appellate Courts. A small subset of information from each case is transferred to the U.S. Party/Case Index each night. The system serves as a locator Index for PACER. Nationwide searches may be conducted to determine whether or not a party is involved in federal litigation. For detailed information on cases found while searching the U.S. Party/Case Index, access the webPACER system for the particular jurisdiction where the case is located.

What you need

To access webPACER you need a computer and access to the Internet via an Internet Service Provider.

What it costs

The cost for the service is .10 per page, with the total for any document not to exceed the fee for thirty pages. Billing occurs on a quarterly basis for time online. Users may enter a client code when dialing into PACER to help facilitate cost management. The client code entered will appear for each transaction on your quarterly statement.

How to Register

Contact the PACER Service Center for a registration form. There is no fee to register.

PACER Service Center
P. O. Box 780549, San Antonio, TX 78278-0549
https://pacer.uscourts.gov
Telephone: 800-676-6856
Internet mail: [email protected]