To retrieve a court case docket, first select your court type: U.S. District Civil or Criminal, U.S. Bankruptcy, U.S. Appellate, U.S. Federal Claims, or U.S. International Trade.  Next select your court. Finally, enter your case/docket number, your invitation_code, and click the "Retrieve Docket" button.

When displaying your docket, if there are more than 3 pages of docket entries, you must view the first three pages of these entries before you can skip to other pages, including the last page, which at the bottom displays when the docket was last updated, contains options to refresh the docket in real-time, print the docket without any advertisements, and download/save the docket without any advertisements.

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When we display a docket, we first divide it into two parts: (1) Summary Information, which contains the parties involved, type of suit, etc., and (2) docket entries. You must view the first three pages of the summary or docket entries before you can skip to other pages, including the last page which at the bottom tells you when the docket was last updated, contains options to refresh the docket in real-time, print the docket without any advertisements, and download/save the docket without any advertisements.

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To print and/or download a full docket that contains no advertisements, you must view the first three pages of the docket before having the ability to go to the last page which at the bottom allows you to do this. You may need to disable your popup blocker.

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On the bottom of the last page of every docket we inform you how long ago it was last updated, and provide the option to update it.

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We are working on making all dockets that we have retrieved provide RSS feeds. When this functionality is implemented you will see an RSS icon on the bottom of the last page to subscribe to that case docket feed. This will allow you to receive an update each time we update that docket.

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While there are exceptions, we have the ability to access most U.S. District Court civil, criminal, bankruptcy, and appellate case dockets filed over the last 20 years or so. This includes approximately 33 million cases. We can also access the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and the U.S. Court of International Trade. Access to all dockets is FREE!

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Available filings/pdfs are linked within our dockets. While we cannot yet provide you these documents for free, clicking these links will bring you directly to the appropriate CM/ECF database. To access these filings, a Pacer account is required. Many written opinions are free. When there is a fee, Pacer will provide the amount before you are charged. EXCEPTION: Within the Summary Information portion of some dockets, if you click on "Show Associated Cases", you are immediately charged without warning, usually eight cents.

Occasionally when trying to retrieve a filing you may get a message indicating the document cannot be located. This usually means that particular filing is sealed, or is not available to the general public.

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To retrieve all court dockets except U.S. Supreme cases, you must first obtain an invitation code from us. Each person must have their own code. Codes MAY NOT be shared. If we detect that you are sharing your code, it will be deactivated without warning or notice.
Request an Invitation Code

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Our site is optimized for the most popular browsers and screen setting: Internet Explorer and Firefox, 1024x768.

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Since we have to purchase our dockets from the federal government, giving them away for free requires significant funding. Please go here if you would like to advertise, become a sponsor, or donate, to allow us to continue to provide free federal court dockets.

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Please go here to contact us about anything EXCEPT advertising, sponsorship, or donations for our site.