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series: State Court Statistics Series > study: State Court Statistics, 2009 >

State Court Statistics, 2009 (ICPSR 34081)

Principal Investigator(s): National Center for State Courts

Summary:

This data collection provides comparable measures of state appellate and trial court caseloads by type of case for the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Court caseloads are tabulated according to generic reporting categories developed by the Court Statistics Project (CSP) Committee of the Conference of State Court Administrators. These categories describe differences in the unit of count and the point of count when compiling each court's caseload. Major areas of investigation include (1) case filings in state appellate and trial courts, (2) case processing and dispositions in state appellate and trial courts, and (3) appellate opinions. The trial caseload consists of civil, domestic relations, criminal, juvenile, and traffic violation cases. The appellate caseload consists of appeal by right, appeal by permission, death penalty, and original proceeding/other appellate matter cases.

Series: State Court Statistics Series

Access Notes

  • These data are freely available.

Dataset(s)

WARNING: Because this study has many datasets, the download all files option has been suppressed, and you will need to download one dataset at a time.

DS1:  Appellate Court Data -- Four Major Categories
DS2:  Appellate Court Data -- Appeal by Right Caseloads
DS3:  Appellate Court Data -- Appeal by Permission Caseloads
DS4:  Appellate Court Data -- Death Penalty Caseloads
DS5:  Appellate Court Data -- Original Proceeding/Other Appellate Matter Caseloads
DS6:  Appellate Court Data -- Grand Totals Caseloads
DS7:  Trial Court Data -- Five Major Categories
DS8:  Trial Court Data -- Civil Caseloads
DS9:  Trial Court Data -- Domestic Relations Caseloads
DS10:  Trial Court Data -- Criminal Caseloads
DS11:  Trial Court Data -- Juvenile Caseloads
DS12:  Trial Court Data -- Traffic Violations Caseloads

Study Description

Citation

Persistent URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR34081.v1

Export Citation:

  • RIS (generic format for RefWorks, EndNote, etc.)
  • EndNote XML (EndNote X4.0.1 or higher)

Funding

This survey was funded by:

  • State Justice Institute
  • United States Department of Justice. Office of Justice Programs. Bureau of Justice Statistics

Scope of Study

Subject Terms:   appellate courts, case processing, caseloads, court cases, disposition (legal), legal appeals, state courts, statistical data, trial courts

Geographic Coverage:   United States

Time Period:  

  • 2009

Date of Collection:  

  • 2009

Unit of Observation:   court

Universe:   State appellate and trial court cases in the United States.

Data Types:   aggregate data

Data Collection Notes:

For additional information please see the Court Statistics Project Web site.

Methodology

Study Design:  

Information for the Court Statistics Project's (CSP) national caseload databases comes from published and unpublished sources supplied by state court administrators and appellate court clerks. Published data are typically taken from official state court annual reports and Web sites, so they take many forms and vary greatly in detail. Data from published sources are often supplemented by unpublished data received from the state courts in many formats, including internal management memoranda and computer-generated output. States also report and verify data electronically through spreadsheet templates provided by the Court Statistics Project.

The CSP data collection effort to build a comprehensive statistical profile of the work of state appellate and trial courts nationally is underway throughout the year. Extensive telephone contacts and follow-up correspondence are used to collect missing data, confirm the accuracy of available data, and determine the legal jurisdiction of each court. Information is also collected on the number of judges per court or court system (from annual reports, offices of state court administrators, and appellate court clerks), the state populations (based on United States Bureau of the Census revised estimates), and special characteristics regarding subject matter jurisdiction and court structure.

Data Source:

Published annual reports of administrative court offices and unpublished statistics provided by state administrative offices of the court and clerks of state appellate courts.

Extent of Processing:  ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:

  • Performed consistency checks.
  • Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.

Version(s)

Original ICPSR Release:  2012-11-29

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