{"id":4396,"date":"2017-01-20T09:28:37","date_gmt":"2017-01-20T14:28:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/?p=4396"},"modified":"2017-11-26T22:33:57","modified_gmt":"2017-11-27T03:33:57","slug":"public-access-policy-for-court-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/?p=4396","title":{"rendered":"Public Access Policy for Court Records"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Supreme Court has adopted a new public access policy for records of appellate and trial courts in Pennsylvania. <em>Public Access Policy of the Unified Judicial System of Pennsylvania: Case Records of the Appellate and Trial Courts; No. 477 Judicial Administration Doc.<\/em>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pabulletin.com\/secure\/data\/vol47\/47-3\/95.html\">47 Pa.B. 291<\/a> (1\/21\/2017).<\/p>\n<p>Included in the new policy is a table of limits to public access for different kinds of cases, with the following limits for matters within the Orphans&#8217; Court:<\/p>\n\n<table id=\"tablepress-125\" class=\"tablepress tablepress-id-125\">\n<thead>\n<tr class=\"row-1\">\n\t<th class=\"column-1\">Subject Area<\/th><th class=\"column-2\">Record Description <\/th><th class=\"column-3\">Accessibility<\/th><th class=\"column-4\">Authority<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n<tbody class=\"row-striping row-hover\">\n<tr class=\"row-2\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\">Orphans\u2019 Court <\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Proceedings related to appointment of<br \/>\nguardianship for incapacitated persons.<\/td><td class=\"column-3\">Shall be closed to the public upon request of the alleged incapacitated person or his counsel. After the individual\u2019s death his\/her estate may access the record of the guardianship proceedings.<\/td><td class=\"column-4\">20 Pa.C.S. \u00a7 5511(a); In re Estate of duPont, 2 A.3d 516 (Pa. 2010).<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr class=\"row-3\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\">Orphans\u2019 Court <\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Records required for foreign adoption decrees.<\/td><td class=\"column-3\">No Public Access unless a court order is granted upon good cause.<\/td><td class=\"column-4\">23 Pa.C.S. \u00a7 2908(F); Pa.O.C.R. 15.7.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr class=\"row-4\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\">Orphans\u2019 Court <\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Adoption records.<\/td><td class=\"column-3\">No Public Access unless otherwise ordered.<\/td><td class=\"column-4\">23 Pa.C.S. \u00a7 2915; see also 23 Pa.C.S. \u00a7 2906; Pa.O.C.R. 15.7.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr class=\"row-5\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\">Orphans\u2019 Court (Family Court in Philadelphia County or Juvenile Court Section of Family Division in<br \/>\nAllegheny County Pa.R.J.A. 2157)<\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Applications of a minor for<br \/>\njudicial approval of decision<br \/>\nto have an abortion, under<br \/>\nthe Abortion Control Act, as<br \/>\nwell as proceedings and the name of the minor.<\/td><td class=\"column-3\">No Public Access; sealed dockets, and documents shall be maintained in a closed file marked \u2018\u2018confidential\u2019\u2019 and identified by case number only.<\/td><td class=\"column-4\">18 Pa.C.S. \u00a7 3206(f); Pa.O.C.R. 16.2 and 16.6. Note also Pa.R.J.A. No. 2157 and Pa.R.A.P. 3801.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<!-- #tablepress-125 from cache -->\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Supreme Court has adopted a new public access policy for records of appellate and trial courts in Pennsylvania. Public Access Policy of the Unified Judicial System of Pennsylvania: Case Records of the Appellate and Trial Courts; No. 477 Judicial &hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/?p=4396\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[29,36],"tags":[312,636],"class_list":["post-4396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-items","category-regulations","tag-orphans-court","tag-public-access-policy","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4396"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4400,"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4396\/revisions\/4400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/resources.evans-legal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}