Add a "filing address" to each court to explain where you can file

[nonprofittechy]

Many courts don't allow filing at a session where a person would appear. We should track that separately so if people file a pleading, it goes to the right place

[nonprofittechy]

E.g., Eastern Housing Court - Chelsea. You cannot file in Chelsea. You need to file at 24 New Chardon St

For most courts filing and physical address are the same. Need to identify which courts this is not true for. Could be a research project that a student helps with?

[nonprofittechy]

As a starting point:

Probably we only know that the District Court and Land Court have the same mailing address as the physical address.

• Almost all of the Housing Courts have only one location that you can file in, that is shared for all of the sessions. E.g., Western Housing Court -- there's one location to mail things, even though there is a Pittsfield, Springfield, etc. session.

• For most of the Superior Courts, there may be 3 in one county, but only one is the right address to mail things to.

• For Probate and Family Court, same thing. There may be more than one court per county, Not clear if you can file at all locations. It might require calling the court, and it might be court-specific to find out.

• Juvenile Court: same, there is one court per county but multiple sittings. It might be that only one court accepts mail.

• Identify any courts that have PO Boxes. The PO box is probably the mailing address (I don't know for sure)

• Sometimes, the description of the court says where to mail things. But sometimes it doesn't.

For each court: set a flag. Does this court accept service by mail at its physical address? This might be redundant but it could be helpful to have a True/False value to check.

[nonprofittechy]

I would start by looking at this page: http://apps-test.suffolklitlab.org/interview?i=docassemble.MACourts:test_local_court_json_files.yml&reset=1

and gathering info for all of the related courts at once. E.g., all of the sessions of the Eastern Housing Court. It may say in the description something like "all cases must be filed at the Boston branch".

Something tricky is the Juvenile courts and Probate and Family Courts sometimes only use the city name, not the county name, but it's important to group by the county. It's the smaller branch locations that are most likely to require you to file at the largest branch.

[nonprofittechy]

My work is mainly in the Probate and Family Court, mostly in Bristol County, but also occasionally in Plymouth and Norfolk.

In normal times, Bristol Probate and Family Court has three locations – Taunton, which is the main location, Fall River and New Bedford. Filings can be made at either Taunton or Fall River, in person, or via mail to Taunton. Electronic filings can also be made. The Taunton location is a 40 Broadway, a court building that includes District, Juvenile, Housing and Probate and Family court sessions. In Fall River, the Probate and Family Ccurt and the Register’s office are both located in a court building located at 289 Rock Street, which also houses the Juvenile and Housing Courts. The New Bedford location is a 505 Pleasant Street and is a stand-alone building that houses only Probate and Family Court sessions. There is a small Register’s Office there, but filings, except for emergencies, are not accepted there. All court records, i.e., case filings, are located at the main Register’s Office in Taunton.

As for Plymouth, the Probate and Family Court has two sessions, one in Brockton and one in Plymouth. Both are in large court houses with other court sessions. I believe certain types of cases are to be filed via mail in Brockton, others in Plymouth. I believe in-person filings can be made at either office. You’d have to confirm this. I believe Norfolk has only one session and one Register’s Office, both in Canton.

I can tell you that during COVID, the means to file new cases is constantly changing. However, I believe currently Bristol Probate filings can either be mailed to Register’s office at the Taunton location m(40 Broadway, Suite 240) or left in a lock-box at that location. Emergency filings, such as abuse prevention orders under M.G.L. c. 209A, can sometimes be filed in person – it’s a moving target. I am not certain about filings during COVID in Plymouth or Norfolk.

Not sure if that is of any help.

[nathan-duddles]

Using the google spreadsheet, so far I've:

Identified all court location webpages that have explicit mailing address (4); column = Filing address; column = URL.

Identified those records where the main address already in the json data contains a PO box. column = address contains po box.

looked at housing courts and identified the ones with limited hours (TRUE) and regular hours (FALSE). column = Housing Court Limited Hours

Identified three records that appear to be duplicates.

[nathan-duddles]

Unfortunately, there don't seem to be details on court location pages, regarding mailing info or special instructions.

[nathan-duddles]

Finally, this court seems to no longer exist: Southeast Housing Court - Barnstable session

It seems that it is being served by: Southeast Housing Court - Plymouth Session

I've made of note of this in the spreadsheet.

[plocket]

Google doc: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14eSNs5fw4a3r5YfWiZNt4ccBvBblvW2PeAYJcQF3WwA/edit#gid=552718053

It seems searching around for other information mostly led to the court location pages.

[nonprofittechy]

Thanks @nathan-duddles , some really great progress. The barnstable session is actually a "new" one that was never added to mass.gov.

[nathan-duddles]

Thanks!

That's right - it seems that even information on some other government pages links to the https://www.mass.gov/locations/ court page, which is good practice. But it would be nice if there were more details on mailing address (only four explicitly provide them). Did not see other specific notes, except hours and transportation.