Oct 06, 2008 - 04:05:20 CDT
Not long ago, I told you about a Web site where you could look up information on anyone who has appeared in North Dakota district court or select municipal courts in recent years. The "Case/Calendar Search" page (www.ndcourts.gov/publicsearch/contactsearch.aspx) offers online the same public records you can access in person by visiting the appropriate courthouse.Certain restricted cases such as mental illness are not included in the searchable public database.
A reader of this column recently asked if there were any online versions of this type of court records search at the federal level.
It's a good question.
About the only place I know of to get information on a person or person's court case at the federal level via the Internet is through the PACER system.
This is run through the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts and is fee-based (8 cents per page accessed - and the government has a formula it uses to calculate what constitutes a "page" on the Web).
You have to preregister to use the PACER system to get a username and password, presumably so they can properly charge a credit card for searches rendered.
To use the service and learn more about what it can and cannot provide, go to http://pacer.psc.uscourts.gov.
Click the "US Party Case Index" link to learn more about the service and which five courts are not indexed in the PACER system.
Clicking the "Links to PACER Web Sites" will take you to a page where you can search specific courts and in specific states.
Class action update
A little over six weeks ago, I told you about a site (www.listclassaction.com) where you could join the class of people who can share in any monetary distribution and credit monitoring services offered by the credit reporting company TransUnion as part of a settlement over selling private data to third parties.
The court granted final approval of the settlement on Sept. 17, and the deadline for signing up was Sept. 24.
If you joined the class action, you should soon receive information via e-mail on what's next for you. If you signed up to receive free credit monitoring services, you should be notified about how it will work and what you need to do. If you signed on for part of any cash distribution, you may have to wait a while before you learn how much you'll get - if any.
If you have any questions about the settlement, you can call a toll-free information number at 866-416-3470. You also can go to www.listclassaction.com and click the "Summary Notice" link to get an overview of the settlement.
Meanwhile, if you want to keep up on details of current and pending class action lawsuits and see if you might qualify as a class member in any of the actions, I'd suggest the "Top Class Actions" Web site (www.topclassactions.com). It's a comprehensive and useful resource for following these types of lawsuits.
A belated update ...
Several months ago, I videotaped a drive across the old Memorial Bridge on the last day it was open to the public. In this column, I told you how you could view the videos online and browse a 360-degree photo view taken from the center of the bridge on the south walkway (www.darnay.com/ iec/bridge/).
I received an e-mail note shortly after the column ran from Cliff Daring of Bismarck, who runs the Bismarck Mandan Blog site (www.bismarckmandanblog.com). Daring, it turns out, was the last person to drive across the bridge before it was officially closed. In his July 31 post, he shows numerous photos of his ride via motorcycle across the bridge, including a few "helmetcam" style photos from the bike as he's driving. The written narrative is quite interesting to read.
And check out his Aug. 6 post of the neat "Face on the Memorial Bridge" photos that beat any "Face on Mars" photos I've ever seen.
(Keith Darnay is the webmaster and designer for www.bismarcktribune.com. His Web site, featuring this column going back to 1995, is at www.darnay.com.iec.)
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