Cases & Workflow
Cases
Cases in the tablet lists every case with a timeline of everything that happened. A case has parties (defendant, plaintiff), charges or a claim, bail, hearings, notes and tabs for counsel, evidence, subpoenas, motions and the jury.
With Kartik MDT the cases live in the MDT's tables, so police see the same cases (case store).
Type, court and stage
Every case has:
- a type: criminal, misdemeanor / citation, civil, business / contract, small claims or appeal
- a court: Municipal → Superior → Court of Appeals → Supreme Court
- a stage: for example filed, arraignment, pre-trial, discovery, trial, disposition, closed
The Workflow card on a case shows its stages, the form of the current stage and the sign-offs it needs:
| Sign-off | Who |
|---|---|
court | A judge |
clerk | Court staff with casesEdit |
prosecution | Prosecution counsel (the plaintiff's counsel in civil cases) |
defense | Defense counsel |
When every role has signed, the case moves to the next stage. Some stages do more:
- An arraignment bail sets the case bail.
- A settled mediation closes the case.
- The last stage closes the case with its decision as the verdict.
Judges can waive a side that has no lawyer. Staff with caseWorkflow change the type, court or stage directly. Everything is set in shared/config/cases.lua.
Appeals
An appeal opens a new case one court up, linked to the old one, with the same counsel. The Supreme Court is final. Citizens file appeals at the kiosk.
Docket
The Docket is a week board of hearings. Drag a hearing to another day to move it. Hearings also show on the docket TV in the lobby.
Other case tools
- Plea deals: the prosecution offers one; the defendant accepts or declines on a prompt or at the kiosk. Accepting closes the case with the agreed sentence.
- Bail: set on the case or at arraignment, posted by anyone at the kiosk (returned after the verdict), forfeited on a no-show.
- Bench warrant: one click for a no-show defendant.
- Settle: close a civil case with a settlement fee.
People & records
People → a citizen shows everything the court holds on them: cases, warrants, orders, supervision, bar status and their criminal record from the MDT (charges, months, fines, officer, report). Judges with expunge adjust a record's sentence or fine, or expunge it, with a reason in the audit log.
Background check issues a signed court document with the record, warrants, orders, open cases, supervision and bar status, ready to print.