Better Access to Public Court Records
RECAP
https://www.recapthelaw.org/
is a free extension for Firefox that improves the experience of using
PACER, the electronic public access system for the U.S. Federal District
and Bankruptcy Courts. It:
* Helps you give back: Contributes to a public archive hosted by the
Internet Archive
* Saves you money: Shows you when free documents are available
* Keeps you organized: Gives you better filenames, enables useful headers
[excerpt]
Access to the nation's federal law proceedings just got a public interest
hack, thanks to programmers from Princeton, Harvard and the Internet
Archive, who released a Firefox plug-in designed to make millions of pages
of legal documents free.
Free as in beer and free as in speech.
The Problem: Federal courts use an archaic, document-tracking system known
as PACER as their official repository for complaints, court motions, case
scheduling and decisions. The system design resembles a DMV computer
system, circa 1988 — and lacks even the most basic functionality, such as
notifications when a case gets a new filing. But what's worse is that
PACER charges 8 cents per page (capped at $2.40 per doc) and even charges
for searches — an embarrassing limitation on public access to information,
especially when the documents are copyright-free.
The Solution: RECAP https://www.recapthelaw.org/ , a Firefox-only plugin,
that rides along as one usually uses PACER — but it automatically checks
if the document you want is already in its own database. The plug-in's
tagline, 'Turning PACER around,' alludes to the fact that its name comes
from spelling PACER backwards. RECAP's database is being seeded with
millions of bankruptcy and Federal District Court documents, which have
been donated, bought or gotten for free by open-government advocate Carl
Malamud and fellow travelers such as Justia.
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