All online Mendocino county criminal court files vanish over the weekend, never to return
Answers sought from Mendo court executive, but all California counties are doing the same, big restrictions, but little or no public discussion or news coverage given
In a blow to public access and openness in Mendocino County, all criminal court files became inaccessible on Friday and will never return online, if all goes to plan.
Once again, the internet, which many hoped would make more information available, has instead restricted it. Removing criminal court files from the internet follows a prohibition on publishing routine booking photos online. It follows laws that now allow all online and court files to be destroyed once a person has completed their sentence. Misuse of public information by the ubiquitous haters and angry trolls found on social media has resulted in numerous moves to prevent the internet from being “eternal” punishment for the accused and even the convicted.
Privacy concerns have come into conflict with the core American value of open and fully visible government. Journalists have always been biased in favor of keeping everything possible and decent in the public eyes, it’s our job and this is obviously a big intrusion into the public’s right to know. Court are not now, nor should ever be, only a place for attorneys and parties to access.
Court files have always been as open and public as possible, an effort led by the legal system itself. All once agreed that it is a core American belief that the workings of government should never be allowed to be invisible. Do they still? How did this come out of the blue like this across the state?
Now if anybody objective really wants to watch, they need to pay to play.
An obvious question is whether these restrictions were designed for those who charge for court files, including the company that contracted with Mendocino County both before and after this transition.
Mendocinocoast.news contacted Mendocino County Superior Court Execuctive Officer Kim Turner Turner promised to answer the questions, but was unable to do so today. Turner has always been among the most professional of county brass, so Mendocinocoast.news will wait and update the story when we have those answers. In the meantime, we will pose those questions here and then update the story after we get the chance to talk to Turner.
This is not a rogue plan by Mendocino County. Turner, in announcing the plan cites California Rules of Court rule 2.503(c). This allows courts to greatly restrict public records over what was done in the past, most notably removing all online viewing of case details for all criminal matters. You can still see who is charged, but nothing in the case files. Online now is nothing more than the calendar. The files with all the details, such as what the alleged crime is, have been removed.
But the 2.503.(c) is several years old. So why now? Why has nothing been written or said about this massive change to the public’s right to know?
The next thing Mendocinocoast.news did was go to the San Francisco Superior Court website, San Francisco County has also withdrawn all of its access to criminal court files and restricted civil files too. San Francisco has set up a labyrinthine process to get criminal court files that involves not just driving to San Francisco but also submitting to a lengthy verification. When did this happen? Why would the public need to be verified to look at public records?
Not sure, but this reporter used the old system in San Francisco to do random searches last year, which led me to find a big local case that nobody else had written about – opponents of Grocery Outlet had sued to block the store in San Francisco, and neither side had issued a press release. This type of random searching and thus the important public news that comes from it, appears to be no longer possible. (Theoretically, the civil complaint files still should come up but did not when I tried to access them).
For over a century, news reporters could go to the courthouse in San Francisco and see paper copies of the cases filed this week. Those paper files were rich troves of public information. The available information was greatly reduced when court files became digital only in 2021. Having pulled files since the early 1980s in 18 California counties., Mendocinocoast.news can say the information available now is the least available ever. We can’t say why it was reduced so much, but we can say that much was lost in 2021 with the digital transformation. But until Friday, at least one could read files at home.
Tyler Technologies now had complete control of local court files. They were also the operators of the old system that the county suddenly ditched.
Glitches are a big deal with computer files. A glitch delayed the launching of the new system on Monday, meaning there was no way whatsoever to get those files on Monday.
Both Ukiah and Fort Bragg’s public kiosk was not available on Monday and may not be all week.
The last time, the glitches completely wrecked public access.
This reporter could not access court files at all for the first 11 months after the 2021 transition. This was a bug that impacted some but not all users. Despite hours of attempted helping by Tyler and county tech support, that problem continued.
When it was resolved (suddenly and without explanation), we found users now had to pay to view court files. Paying to LOOK at court files was a first in 2021. From roughly 1921 to 2021 court files were free to look at, but copies cost money. All of this discourages any objective reporter who wants to look at all files, not just those with well-known cases. I have paid to open dozens of files, only to find they weren’t worth it. Then I have also found files that seem to have been intentionally covered up. My strongest belief as a reporter is not to do only the story that everybody else is doing but to ask, what else is there? The answer to this question eventually leads to much better information than the stories everybody else is doing.
Since 2021, this reporter has paid several hundred dollars to review court files from Mendocino County. This was a money-making tactic from Mendocino County. Evidence of this is that wen I used the exact same Tyler search engine in San Francisco, viewing files was free from 2021 until now (or whenever they removed almost everything from online viewing).
At one time, all county records could. be accessed online through the 26 letters of the alphabet. From about 2000-2019, this system provided the best access ever offered to news reporters. One could find any name and see what cases had been filed involving that name dating back 40 years. Then one could go to the courthouse and pull the paper file. For a reporter, this offered fairness to look at all cases, not just those selected by authorities for publicity. The 2021 change forced one to know the name before the search could be made. There was no way to simply look at all the new cases and be fair and pick. Everything got way more controlled and now the tightening of control has been racheted up. No way and no time to do objective searches of all cases.
Now all county records are found in one place, a site run by Tyler Technologies. Tyler has a statewide court index that any user of Mendocino County records, or San Francisco County records must use. Some other counties use other vendors, but their records appear to be on the site below, that one can access by clicking the blue writing.
It’s free to sign up. But then, what nobody has mentioned so far is that the services now offered by Tyler, such as getting contacted about case hearings, are NOT FREE.
Reviewing court records will be very expensive going forward, pretty much ruling out those who are doing it solely to find information on cases relevant to the public. The court system has seemingly lost touch with third parties and media. Its now more of a tool for the lawyers who can charge $100 per hour to do research.
If you want Mendocino criminal and civil court files, you can get them by paying yet another private company. It’s expensive, but money can buy any file you want from home. But to get the same thing, the general public must go and sit at a terminal, when those work and when somebody else is not using them.
Next, Mendocinocoast.news tried the online search engine for Lake County records. That court has more information from a different vendor offering a bit more information but still no access to any criminal court files.
A big question we hope Turner can answer: Why did Mendocino County make this big change on Friday?
There is no question that criminal court files, and many civil court files will no longer be offered remotely online. (Remote online is an oxymoron, so Mendocinocoast.news is going to stop using it now, despite it being a key point in the eyes of these court systems. The counties are now offering in-person only online at courthouses, which really isn’t “online” at all).
A press release issued by Turner says that kiosks have been installed at the Fort Bragg and Ukiah courthouses. Someone like Mendocinoocoast.news can go through the Allied Security checkpoint and then sit down at a special computer for searching.
One of the questions Mendocinocoast.news has asked Turner, is once there, can I somehow download case files for later reading? If not, this is an even bigger blow to public access than just removing all the online cases. The California Judicial Council, which appears to have enacted this law, has long been dedicated to clarity and accuracy in public information.
This would be a big step towards inaccuracy and confusion if no member of the public can retain a public file.
Another big question is how did this all come to be?
The county offers a tutorial online that purports to explain the new system. However, when Mendocinocoast.news tried this, it was fifty seconds long and simply said to go to the new site and sign up. The video purports to be nine minutes long, but only the first fifty seconds function, with two other people now having tried to use it.
Then Mendocinocoast.news tried the Ukiah and Fort Bragg courthouses to see if we could come in and try the new kiosks,
We were told there were technical difficulties so no, records would not be viewable until the problem was fixed. They hope that can be resolved this week, possibly as soon as Tuesday.
So one day with zero access to court files. Maybe more. Maybe 11 months again, for some of us.
The Fort Bragg courthouse has no hearings or trials this week, as the judge is on vacation. The county has cut back services to the Fort Bragg courthouse, such as removing in-person translation services and providing a translator by Zoom only on Mondays, either one Monday a month or more than one. The lack of a translator caused last Monday’s court session that Mendocinocoast.news attended in person to be much more chaotic and take longer than it otherwise would have been.
There is now just one deputy district attorney working in Fort Bragg and the lack of a translator has impacted case preparation and docket organization in a big way. Mendocinocoast.news plans a separate story on that matter.
Going forward, the media will have a much more difficult job if we want to look at criminal court cases and write about them based on a particular standard.
How does this impact the reader and your right and ability to know?
Remember the Cubbison criminal case?
If that happened now, chances are many more people would have much less information.
The Cubbison case featured one county elected official, the district attorney charged another, Chamise Cubbison, the elected auditor-controller. County taxpayers would know far, far less about that case if it happened tomorrow instead of last year.
Mendocino county once had several courtroom reporters, but they are all gone. This case was an exception. Mike Geniella, who is something of the Bob Woodward of Mendocino County, covered the case live for the chain newspapers in Ukiah, Fort Bragg and Mendocino, along with the Anderson Valley Advertiser, Mendofever and Redheaded Blackbelt.
Many people accessed online files about the people vs Cubbison online right up until the judge threw the case out. Records were readily available online and many followed along. Now all the records will be available at the courthouse- when glitches arent happening , and nowhere near the amount of info as one could review during the paper file day.
In the future, a case like the Cubbison criminal case will be much more difficult for the public or the press to monitor. And if files can’t be downloaded by a reporter, the information would get even skinnier. Geniella, for example, got no response from the likes of the county’s hired attorney according to one of his articles. He was able to resort to quotes from files and testimony. Will the county allow paper copies to be printed? How much will they cost? These are questions that will determine the right of the public to know. All these rules would apply equally to a news reporter or a member of the general public.
But could access to public records go from greatly restricted to not at all?
While Mendocino County has committed to offering records removed from online viewing at the Fort Bragg and Ukiah courthouses, there is a loophole for counties to use that would make criminal records (and some civil) completely inaccessible.
That same California court rule says the county never needs to provide any public access to criminal records and many civil court records if it can show it does not have the technical ability to offer that information at the courthouse.
Having looked at three counties, Lake, Mendocino and San Francisco and found they have radically different approaches to public records, could some counties not be offering them at all?
Unknown, but one thing is for sure. California is now in the era where court records are the hardest ever to access.
The current change is a drastic, radical shift away from openness. With the news media that covers the courts being reduced more than 90 percent by the Internet (my own estimate, but one can look away from celebrity cases to local courts I believe its an underestimate) n the future, taxpayers will have to trust the courts are working properly. With information that is much harder to access it will be difficult for anyone to keep a watch over the courtroom.
The county is acting on what certainly appears to be solid legal grounds, so any solution would have to be statewide.
Mendocinocoast.news plans to contact advocates for Open Public records in the follow up for this story.
The following is the press release from the county. Note – the benefits touted are only for parties in the case and the vendor charges money to get these services, at least for the public.
MENDOCINO COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT
LAUNCHES A NEW ON-LINE PRODUCT
TO ACCESS CASE INFORMATION AND DOCUMENTS
The Mendocino County Superior Court announces a replacement to the Case Information Portal that the public, attorneys and government partners have been using since 2021. The court is
unveiling this new web-based product, re:Search CA, which is fully integrated with the court’s case management system. The public will be required to register, using their email addresses, for
access to court records in the new system. Access to the current Case Information Portal will be disabled immediately once the court goes live on re:Search CA, as Portal technology is no longer
supported by the vendor. The go-live date for re:Search CA is August 1, 2025. Members of the public, parties to cases, attorneys, government partners, and others trying to access cases through the Portal will be redirected to re:Search CA beginning on this date.
Re:Search CA has many new features and enhancements that were not available in the Portal. (all of these benefits apply only to parties, not the public) Individuals and attorneys can create custom “dashboards” of their own cases and can set up
custom court calendars to improve their ability to find information quickly. They can also set up alerts and reminders to be notified of upcoming hearings or when opposing parties file
documents. For attorneys and parties to cases, they can access confidential documents that are not available to anyone else. Document viewing, downloading and purchasing will also be
easier.
All Mendocino court case records are now maintained in electronic form. In addition, most civil
cases will also be available remotely. However, as required by California Rules of Court rule
2.503(c), there are many case types that require the viewers that are not parties or attorneys to a case to come to the courthouse to view records. The court has set up kiosks in the Ukiah and
Fort Bragg courthouses to allow the public to access non-confidential criminal, family law, restraining order, conservatorship and guardianship cases. The kiosks are located adjacent to the clerk’s offices and instructions are available to assist the public in performing these record
searches. Any time a publicly available case is made confidential by court order or by a change
in law, it will no longer be viewable.
All individuals that wish to view cases remotely or at the courthouse will have to register their
email addresses on re:Search CA. Individuals who are not parties to cases will be able to view non-confidential documents and hearing dates. Parties to cases, their attorneys and other
participants in cases will have enhanced access to be able to see public and confidential informationdocuments and will be able to set up special features to improve their experience in monitoring
their cases. For more information contact: Kim Turner
Court Executive Officer
100 N. State Street, Room 303
Ukiah, CA 95482
kim.turner@mendocino.courts.ca.gov
Final editor’s note- From the time I started in journalism till now, juvenile cases have been off limits to the media. At some point family law and divorce cases also became restricted, decades ago. This reporter is FINE with that. There is no real reason to be reporting on that material.
However, stronger restrictions on restraining orders and conservatorships are being enacted. A person can lose all their rights in a conservatorship. Remember Brittany Spears and that conservatorship? This can be something of media and public interest, as can be restraining orders. Everything is moving toward less public information, less reporters, less files, and less time for all of us. The move away from sunshine laws into darkness laws is incredibly troubling to this lifelong news man.
