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Monday, December 18, 2006
Ind. Courts - More on: "Court - Kentucky Supreme Court carries out records purge - county judges and prosecutors irate"
In this entry last week on the records purge in Kentucky the ILB asked whether the same thing could happen here in Indiana.
A knowledgeable source has written to say: "We will not be facing the same problems as prosecutors and judges in Kentucky are right now." More:
The Indiana policy on court records retention is found in Administrative Rule 7, which has gone through numerous and extensive revisions. The most recent amendments took effect January 1, 2006, and they were extensive. Special training sessions had to be held for County Clerks all over the state.Here is the very long and detailed Rule 7, Judicial Retention Schedules, from the Indiana Administrative Court Rules.
Note this caution from Rule 7, far different from the Kentucky position:
It is critically important that these schedules be carried out exactly as approved since this is your legal authority to do so, and only for the records so listed. Once a record is destroyed, its information is lost. Do not assume that the record under consideration is the record actually authorized for destruction. You must compare both the title and content before a record series can be destroyed. Work in a spirit of caution. If in doubt, save until you can get advice from the Division of State Court Administration or the Indiana Commission on Public Records.To sum it up, it looks like most Indiana court records of any import are to be permanently maintained, either in the original or on microfilm.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on December 18, 2006 09:26 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts