Pacer: What if you don't have the case number or name information?

[Born]

How does one access pacer and get information on a case and name if you don't have the case number or name information?

[sass4221]

Signing up for a PACER account is easy but you do need either the name or the case number to find any case.

[Born]

Originally Posted by sass4221

Signing up for a PACER account is easy but you do need either the name or the case number to find any case.

Sass, when you say name what do you mean by that? is it the inmates name or another name?

[sass4221]

Originally Posted by Born

Sass, when you say name what do you mean by that? is it the inmates name or another name?

If it's a criminal case, the inmates name will be in the caption. For instance, if you were charged in federal court, the case name would be US v. Born so you would look the case up on PACER with your first and last name.

[AyaStar]

There are a number of different ways to search, "party search" can be the defendants name, the judge's name, defense counsel, or the gov't counsel's name. the more precise you enter the search field, the more narrow your result will be. The first list will cost a dime, when you find the case you are looking for, viewing the lengthy documents will cost a bit more, but, if you don't incur more than $35 in a quarter, the charge gets written off.

[bellisq]

I don't get what you're saying. Born is looking for a specific person. Looking up anything else would be pointless. I don't think you can look up a judge's name, but you can look up lawyers' names, but you can end up with huge lists.

[AyaStar]

Right, you would look up lawyers if you are background checking a lawyer's credential, say, a lawyer says he's got crim defense experience, so the best place to look is Pacer, because the data is real, not just what he says. I had to learn the hard way a few years ago, hiring a crook based on her website, by the time i realized to check on Pacer...all her cases are "po: petty offense".

[bellisq]

I don't think you are correct about Pacer. It is the Federal Court system information, petty offenses are not relevant. It is hard to evaluate a lawyer's effectiveness. I've found that good reputations can far outlive a lawyer's effectiveness.