Utah District Court CMECF Updates

Utah District Court CMECF Updates Blog - Closing Down

2010-01-06T15:13:00.003-07:00

After a slow year of CM/ECF news for the District of Utah, it appears to be time to formally close this blog. Now that CM/ECF is routine, the blog has had less to record and share.
The blog won't be deleted, for the possibility that it may return to life if there is a large change, but the court website will be the best resource for CM/ECF information until further notice.

Utah District Court Web Site Down

2009-10-12T10:14:00.007-07:00

Due to a power outage at the circuit court level, the District of Utah internet site was down from Saturday October 10, 2009 at 6 am through Sunday October 11 at noon. During this time, the Court's CM/ECF portal was open, but this may have been unknown for those who customarily access CM/ECF via the link on the court's web site. Bookmarking the court's CM/ECF login page at https://ecf.utd.circ10.dcn/ is probably a smart move. This blog has been modified at the right side to include a link to the CM/ECF login page.

New Redaction Reminders

2009-10-06T17:53:00.006-07:00

The court has loaded a new version 3.2.3 of CM/ECF. There is a new box that e-filers must check every time they log in. If the box is not checked this error message is displayed:
You must check the redaction rules checkbox to login to CM/ECF.

Also, the message on the last screen before submission has been changed to add: "Have you redacted?"

CM/ECF 4.0 May Renumber Old Docket Entries

2009-09-30T09:31:00.009-07:00

Districts using CM/ECF version 4.0 (being tested in Utah now) report that this new version may create problems for existing documents which reference previously filed papers. While current CM/ECF versions number the main document filed as 5-1, and attachments as 5-2, 5-3, etc., the new version of CM/ECF will number a main document as 5 and the attachments as 5-1, 5-2, etc. Compare the two screen shots, with the pink screen showing version 4.0 treatment of attachments.

In some documents now on file, an author may have referenced a document by its "hyphenated" docket number to be precise. However, the installation of CM/ECF version 4.0 apparently converts legacy numbers from the old system (in which the main document had a hyphenated nubmers to the new system where the main document has no hyphenated number. As one court states, "Our concern is that we now have orders filed containing citations that are no longer accurate. For example, if an order cited to a specific exhibit at document 45-6, that exhibit's documents number is now 45-5. We anticipate this could become an issue for orders ultimately appealed to our circuit court." The topic is under discussion by courts who are considering a possible request that prior established numbering be preserved.

PACER in the Spotlight

2009-09-10T12:07:00.001-07:00

Two posts on yesterday's beSpacific blog highlight PACER and the attention recently focused on the for-fee service. The first post directs readers to the PACER spending survey directed to law libraries related to the law librarians' petition to improve PACER. The survey respondents included fifty-eight law firm libraries and sixty-six law school libraries. In 2008, the firm libraries spent on average $13,068.48 on PACER while the law school libraries spent on average $656.74 on PACER. The law firms don't usually impose restrictions on PACER use, while the law libraries generally do.
The other beSpacific post reports a draft working paper from Stephen Schultze at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard. The Electronic Public Access Fees and the United States Federal Courts' Budget study is also related to the fee-generating function of PACER. While the paper is in draft, its purpose is stated as urging "reconsideration of how the Judiciary might more closely align its information management practices with modern technology, practices of the other branches, and public expectations." The draft report summarizes the sometimes varying statements about the uses of PACER revenues, and argues that the policy of government transparency should eliminate PACER fees.

NARA says "Improve Your Image"

2009-07-01T14:57:00.002-07:00

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has published higher standards for scanning resolution, which better support archival preservation. Threfore, the Administrative Office of the United States Courts is asking courts and attorneys to use scanner settings of 300 pixels per inch (ppi) or higher. Courts are asked to increase the maximum CM/ECF file size setting by 25% to allow for higher scanning settings without requiring additional splitting of filed documents.

Tenth Circuit Moves To Electronic Filing

2009-04-28T12:08:00.004-07:00

A General Order from the Tenth Circuit (March 18, 2009) marks the Circuit's move to electronic filing. " On March 31, 2009, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit will transition to voluntary ECF. On June 1, 2009, ECF will become mandatory for counsel of record." CBTs (Computer Based Training modules) for Tenth Circuit e-filing can be found at: http://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/clerk/ecf_training.php. A User's Manual, training registration and other materials are available on the court's website. http://www.ck10.uscourts.gov/
Progress has been remarkable. The bar has already docketed and uploaded 313 documents.
District Courts have already begun transmitting an electronic record on appeal (ROA). In 2007 the court received approximately 900 hardcopy ROAs. In 2008, 585 electronic ROAs and 413 hardcopy were filed. As of April 2009, 303 electronic and only 59 hardcopy ROAs were filed. The majority of the 59 hardcopy ROAs are habeas pro se matters.

Privacy Awareness

2009-04-09T15:09:00.003-07:00

In response to recent concerns about personal data appearing in court filings, the courts have modified the login pages of CM/ECF to "display a message to remind filing attorneys of their obligation to redact personalidentifiers."
A recent letter from Senator Lieberman to the Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure asked the courts to review their processes:

I have concerns that not enough has been done to protect personal information contained in publicly available court filings, potentially violating another provision of the E-Government Act. A recent investigation by Carl Malamud of the non-profit Public.Resource.org found numerous examples of personal data not being redacted in these records.

The court policy states that the redaction responsibilities for filed documents rest with the filer. The courts' official response to Senator Lieberman's letter outlined the complexity of the privacy issue in court records, and restated the courts' committment to educating lawyers about the need for privacy redactions. The notice in CM/ECF is designed to remind filers of their responsibilities.

Wait a Minute Mr. Postman!

2009-04-08T11:11:00.006-07:00

The court has received a rush of replies to CM/ECF Notices of Electronic Filing. Like movie stars, we don't reply to our e-mail, but we wonder what happens when these messages are not received by intended recipients. (click an image to see a larger version.)

Unusual Signatures for Other Counsel

2009-03-25T13:41:00.005-07:00

The Utah Administrative Procedures for electronic filing specify the way to denote the signature of other counsel on motions or stipulations. Two recent filings show those instructions may be confusing. The instructions require (i) /s/ and the typed name of the other attorney; (ii) a description of the reason justifying the signature; and (iii) an elecronic signature or /s/ and the typed name of the filing attorney:

Signatures of Other Attorneys. When a document to be filed requires the signature of attorneys other than that of the filing attorney, such as a stipulation, the attorney may obtain approval from any other attorney to state that the other attorney has authorized the filing attorney to electronically sign the document. Such approval shall be indicated by any of the following:

a. Verbal Approval for Electronic Signature
/s/ Other Attorney
(Signed by Filing Attorney with permission of Plaintiff Attorney)
Electronic Signature or /s/ Filing Attorney

b. Approval by Signature. The filing attorney may obtain and maintain a paper copy of the document signed by the other attorney. Possession of a signed copy shall be indicated as follows:
/s/ Other Attorney
(Signed copy of document bearing signature of Other Attorney is being maintained in the ofice of the Filing Attorney)
Electronic Signature or /s/ Filing Attorney

Both recent filings omit the signature of the filing attorney which attests to the parenthetical reason for attachment of another attorney's signature.

The first example shows the instructions taken literally, with the words "Other Attorney appearing on the signature line, rather than the name of the other attorney.

The second example shows the name of the other attorney below the line on which it should appear.

Once a Week is Enough to Review Email?

2009-03-17T16:59:00.002-07:00

Not that the court monitors all auto-replies to Notices of Electronic Filing (sometimes we do get humorous/incriminating rants meant for opposing counsel, staff or the ether) but this one raised lots of speculation.

Pursuant to my email management policy, your email will be retrieved and reviewed on March 19, 2009. [Automatically generated.]
/s/ [Attorney Name]

Does this mean that Thursday is email review day for this attorney?

New Password Recovery Tool

2009-03-13T12:33:00.005-07:00

The District of Utah has a new feature for attorneys who have lost their CMECF password. It is at the login screen on the outside server.

Clicking on the link will take the user to a page where they can enter their login or the primary email address for the user's CM/ECF notices of electronic filing, which will trigger an email that will allow the user to reset their password. This should allow attorneys to reset their password during or after business hours.

Help Desk assistance is still avilable during working hours for other login issues.

Help Desk (801) 524-3248
Hours: M-F 9 am - 1 pm - voice mail, leave message
1 pm - 4:30 pm live assistance

NOTE: The password reset is only for the CM/ECF password from Utah, not the PACER password or CM/ECF passwords from other districts.

What motions are pending in my case?

2009-03-02T19:55:00.004-07:00

A new tool has been added to PACER for the District of Utah to show a list of motions pending in a case. The report is in the Query area of PACER.

The Attorney Motions Report will list all motions pending in a case. The report is also a way to see the trial date and case flags, including a jury demand.

To see this report, go to the Query area of PACER:

CM/ECF 4.0 Released to Select Courts

2009-03-02T16:49:00.002-07:00

CM/ECF 4.0 for district courts was released February 18, 2009, for selected district courts, including those who have been testing it. After April 1, other courts will be encouraged to implement CM/ECF 4.0. Many features in this release are designed to assist chambers, but the process for attachment of documents will assist attorney e-filers. No date has been set for installation of CM/ECF 4.0 in Utah.

Electronic Summons - Return Filed

2009-01-22T18:54:00.005-07:00

The first summons issued electronically by the clerk in the District of Utah has been returned. The header of the summons shows that it was docketed as issued on January 7th, and then docketed after service on January 14th.

Under the new program, counsel may email summons to the court, which will affix a signature and seal and then return the summons to the attorney for service. The summons and return of service may then be electronically filed. Because of privacy concerns in cases involving individuals, the summons and return are restricted documents, not available through CM/ECF.

New York Times Praises Dual and Large Monitors

2009-01-16T15:32:00.003-07:00

The most recent in many articles praising the productivity increases from large screen or dual monitors appeared in yesterday's New York Times. Farhad Manjoo says that his "experience confirmed [that] having a lot of screen space significantly raised my productivity." He says:

A host of studies by specialists in human-computer interaction suggest that combining two displays, or using a single huge monitor, can significantly enhance your productivity. The theory is simply that the bigger your monitor, the more of your work you’ll be able to see and the more you’ll be moved to do.
In a study commissioned by the electronics company NEC, researchers at the University of Utah recently asked office workers to perform several common tasks using various monitor configurations. They found that people who used two 20-inch monitors were 44 percent more productive at certain text-editing operations than people using a single 18-inch monitor.

More on multiple or large monitors can be found on the Utah District Court website at http://www.utd.uscourts.gov/documents/Dual_monitors.html

Summons Issued Electronically by the Court

2009-01-06T13:08:00.003-07:00

As of today, attorneys no longer need to come to the courthouse with paper to have a summons issued. This notice was sent to all members of the court's bar today.

Notice From the Clerk of Court
Attorneys may request that the clerk of court issue summons in civil cases electronically. Instead of issuing a summons in paper, the clerk may issue a summons, prepared by counsel and emailed to the court in PDF. The court will then electronically sign and seal the summons, and return it, via NEF (emailed Notice of Electronic Filing) to counsel for service. More information is available on the court's website at http://www.utd.uscourts.gov/cmecf/elec_summons_atty.pdf.
D. Mark Jones, Clerk
United States District Court for the District of Utah

PACER Alternative

2008-12-15T10:00:00.000-07:00

The man who reportedly prodded the SEC into allowing free access to corporate filings has set his sights on PACER. According to WIRED, Carl Malamud, who runs the nonprofit open-government group Public.Resource.Org, is "asking lawyers to donate their PACER documents one by one, which he then classifies and bundles into ZIP files published for free at his organization's website. The one-year-old effort has garnered him 20 percent of all the files on PACER, including all decisions from federal appeals courts over the last 50 years."
According to WIRED, PACER is "an absurdity in the era of Google, blogs and Wikipedia, where information is free and bandwidth, disk space and processing power are nearly so."

District of Utah Tests Electronic Summons

2008-12-02T09:00:00.001-07:00

The District of Utah is testing electronic issuance of summons. As Bob Wilde pointed out in a recent email, the lack of electronic summons issuance discourages electronic filing of complaints.

My secretary and I were discussing the anomalous situation which has virtually all documents getting e-filed but requires us to come to the clerk’s office to get summons issued. The result for us is that it is just easier to take everything, summons, complaint, cover sheet, check, etc., to court and file it conventionally than it is to file everything but the summons electronically and then get the summons to the clerk’s office for issuance by hand. Certainly there is some way we could submit an electronic copy of the summons which could then be issued and returned to us electronically so we can print it for service. I don’t know if this is a local rules issue or a CM-ECF issue but it seems to me it would be easier for all concerned if we could find a way to do summons electronically.

The clerk's office has been testing electronically issued summons (service must still be made under Rule 4) and has created a form that will likely be used in 2009.

Sprint -Cogent Update

2008-11-20T14:30:00.001-07:00

The dispute between Sprint and Cogent continues, but the Administrative Office of the United States Courts has "been advised that Sprint does not intend to break the connections with Cogent without providing advance warning. Sprint has stated that they are committed to providing a minimum of sixty (60) days notice before any shutdown occurs."

Sprint and Cogent Make Temporary Peace

2008-11-03T15:57:00.001-07:00

As reported last week, Sprint terminated its internet connections with Cogent due to a dispute between the two firms. Between Thursday afternoon, October 30, and Sunday afternoon, November 2, those internet peering connections were severed. This prevented any law firm or any member of the public using Cogent as an ISP from getting access to CM/ECF, PACER, or the courts' public web sites. This disruption also prevented Cogent subscribers from filing case materials, receiving notices of electronic filing (NEFs), or reviewing case records already in the system. Similarly, e-mail traffic from a court could not be received by Cogent subscribers.
These connections have been TEMPORARILY restored over the weekend by Sprint. Sprint indicates that this reconnection will last approximately two weeks while the two companies attempt to resolve their dispute.
Given the two-week reconnection period Cogent subscribers may need to find alternative means of completing their court related transactions. Immediate planning for this potential change is recommended.
Sprint and Cogent have published their respective views on the dispute.

Sprint-Cogent Dispute May Disrupt CM/ECF Access for Cogent Customers

2008-10-31T11:45:00.000-07:00

A news report today on the PCWorld Business Center states:

Sprint-Nextel has decided to sever its Internet connection with Cogent, another Internet service provider, according to a statement from Cogent.
Internet health data supplied by Keynote Systems indicates that Cogent and Sprint are no longer exchanging traffic.
As a result, it is no longer possible for many Sprint customers and Cogent customers to directly communicate across the Internet.

Since Sprint provides internet connectivity to the US Courts, CM/ECF and PACER may be unavailable to Cogent customers until traffic exchange is restored. This disruption will also affect email service between those customers and the courts.

The courts have been instructed "The only guidance we can provide you at this time is to inform [Cogent customers] that we are working to find a resolution with Sprint, but short of the Cogent user switching to another ISP they will have to wait until Sprint restores communication with Cogent. A notice explaining that Cogent subscribers may be experiencing access difficulties is being placed on the PACER and uscourts.gov websites, with directions to contact the local court if they have filing questions."

Automate Cross-Document Hyperlinks

2008-09-19T15:01:00.001-07:00

In versions 3.1 and above, CM/ECF users may file a document that includes a hyperlink to a previously filed document in the same case or to any other document in any other case that resides on the CM/ECF system, even in other courts. When the judge reads a memorandum reference to a declaration or deposition, a cross-document hyperlink in the memorandum can take the judge to that declaration or deposition. The hyperlink, as set by the filer, may link to the start of the document or to a specific page in the document. A filer can file a document that includes a hyperlink to a document that is being filed simultaneously (in the same docketing transaction) with the primary document (e.g., a Memo in Support of Summary Judgment may have hyperlinks to the attached documents that are part of the same docketing transaction).

This feature is described in the version 3.1 release notes, and in a video on the court's web site.

Now, an automated tool is available for users of Microsoft Word, to automatically create cross-document hyperlinks to already filed documents in the CM/ECF system as a new document is being prepared for filing. This Add-In works in Word 2003 and above on both Windows XP and Vista.

PDFs That Don't Appear

2008-07-29T07:25:00.002-07:00

A CM/ECF user recently presented this issue:

I have two PCs with IE 7 and Acrobat 6 standard. On one system there's no problem. On the other, when I click on the NEF document link or click on any document link on any docket report I get a blank page and a yellow triangle with exclamation point in the lower left corner. Clicking on that displays the message "Problems with this web page preventit from being displayed properly or functioning correctly." This started about two weeks ago. Any ideas?

A solution was presented by setting Acrobat preferences to not open the PDF documents in a browser window. Instructions are found at http://www.wawb.uscourts.gov/view.htm?f=25&id=422&v=5.
Setting preferences to open Acrobat documents in Acrobat rather than in the browser window also allows use of all the Acrobat menus, which is important if using Acrobat Standard or Professional. Then, the user can edit, OCR, and annotate PDF documents.

Another Redaction that Wasn't Effective

2008-05-28T13:13:00.003-07:00

Douglas Mallan writes in the Connecticut Law Tribune about "A Major Redaction Gaffe" in a case involving General Electric. Again, embarassing information specifically intended NOT to be public is in the public's hands.

An "Emergency Motion to Seal by Consent of Parties" filed May 22, 2008 in Schaefer v. General Electric Co (Case No. 3:07-cv-00858-PCD) stated:

Due to technical errors, Plaintiffs respectfully request, and Defendants agree, that the following pleadings be sealed and public access be suspended until Plaintiffs can re-file corrected versions of the documents: [A list of 8 docket entries followed.]

The motion was granted May 23rd, and corrected PDFs were uploaded May 28th.

click image to enlarge

Kansas State Court Suspends Bankruptcy Lawyer for Not E-Filing

2008-04-18T15:44:00.001-07:00

In the first known case of its type, a lawyer has been disciplined by a state disciplinary authority in part for for failure to electronically file in federal court. The lawyer was generally neglectful of two clients' matters, and dishonest with them and with disciplinary authorities, but as to one client, e-filing was a central issued.
The attorney was requested to file a bankruptcy petition electronically before the 2005 change in law, and told the client he was an e-filer. Then , the attorney told the client he was not actually an e-filer but would obtain a login and password before the end of the week. The client terminated the attorney client relationship, and hired a lawyer who did e-file his petition. But the discipined attorney failed to refund the fee.
The court said that the lawyer's failure to e-file for clients (in violation of the Kansas Bankruptcy Court mandatory requirement to e-file) breached his duty to provide competent representation and to act with reasonable diligence and promptness in representing clients. The lawyer had previously been admonished by the bankrupcty court for attempting to file in paper. In re Harris, No. 99,294, --- P.3d ----, 2008 WL 818993 (Kan. March 28, 2008).

WordPerfect X4 Adds PDF Features

2008-04-17T05:25:00.000-07:00

The new WordPerfect X4 adds many features to further enable its PDF functionality. Among those listed on the Corel website in addition to the PDF Import feature in WordPerfect X3 are:

PDF Image Import
PDF/A standard, used for archiving
PDF File Size Options

Failures to Receive E Notice - NOT Excusable

2008-04-07T09:25:00.002-07:00

Two cases recently summarized by LexisNexis CourtLink considered different circumstances in which counsel failed to receive enotice, and also failed to obtain any relief from the court.
In the first, In Re Sulzer, No. 1:01-CV-9000, MDL Docket No. 1401, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10712, 2006 WL 4910299 (N.D. Ohio March 14, 2006) pro hac vice counsel failed to enter his email address and this did not receive notice of entry of an order. The appeal time ran before counsel was aware of the entry, and then moved for extension of time for appeal. The court denied the motion, saying "In order to receive automatic email notifications of Court Orders upon their filing, Harris (or his paralegal) merely needed to enter his email address on the docket via ECF. Apparently, however, Harris failed to take this elementary step." Further, because "[t]he law is clear that parties have an affirmative duty to monitor the dockets to inform themselves of the entry of orders they may wish to appeal," and "[t]he law is clear that parties have an affirmative duty to monitor the dockets to inform themselves of the entry of orders they may wish to appeal,” the court denied any relief.
In the second, Pace v. USAA, No. 05-cv-01562-LTB-MJW,
2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 49425, 2007 WL 2022059 (D. Colo. July 9, 2007) court notices were caught in the law firm's spam filter. Thus, counsel and their party failed to appear at a scheduled settlement conference. The court ordered an award of attorney's fees to the appearing party, because there was nothing to "show that failure of plaintiff's counsel to appear for the scheduled settlement conference on May 30, 2007, was substantially justified." The law firm's IT specialist re-set spam settings, but "never bothered to check to see if any of the emails from this court were being filtered" enen though "even though he previously whitelisted the court domain names of the Colorado State Courts."

It's That Easy!

2008-03-11T10:15:00.002-07:00

Chambers received a call yesterday from a lawyer who had items due -- but whose office was without power. Within minutes, a one day extension was on the CM/ECF record.
Docket Text:

ORDER extending to March 11, 2008 the deadline for Plaintiffs to serve discovery requests and/or file a motion to supplement the administrative record, based on representations of [Plaintiff's] counsel that an electrical power failure has affected his office today.

The lawyer may have been a victim of the same outage that affected TRAX yesterday.

Do-it-yourself Filing Dates?

2008-02-27T11:37:00.002-07:00

A recent filing contains an ineffective attempt to state a filing date before the date of actual filing.
(click image to enlarge)

The secretary for the attorney had called the help desk on the morning of the 20th to describe the unfortunate events. She said she loaded the Response and all the attachments on the 19th, right before she went home. She said she clicked the NEXT button but apparently did not wait to make sure the NEF loaded.

When she arrived at work the 20th, she found that the entry had not been added to the case (but the filing deadline was the 19th). Before she proceeded to file the Response on the 20th, she called the help desk to ask if the court would make a notation in the docket text to show that the document was filed the 19th. She was informed that this was not true and not possible. So she efiled the Response and added to the text herself.

Of course, this attempt is ineffective. According to the Administrative Procedures, technical problems on the user's end are not correctible by the court. The system generated filing date is the actual filing date, not any date inserted by a filer.

As of this date, the superfluous and misleading text has not been stricken.

Netscape Browser Support Ends

2008-02-10T01:14:00.000-07:00

"Official support for all Netscape client products will end on March 1st, 2008, according to Netscape's website. The official announcement states development work ended February 1st. "We'll continue to release security patches for the current version of the browser, Netscape Navigator until February 1, 2008. After February 1, there will be no more active product support for Navigator 9, or any previous Netscape Navigator browser."
A prior post on this blog noted that Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer are recommended for CM/ECF 3.1.

CM/ECF 3.1 is Up in Utah

2008-02-02T12:29:00.000-07:00

The team at the District of Utah has completed installation of CM/ECF 3.1.2. This notice appears on the CM/ECF page:

The new version has a distinctive look -- cascading menus are the most prominent:

Testing will continue through the weekend.
Users will notice that they need to use Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer to work with this version of CM/ECF.

Very Large Filings

2008-01-25T09:43:00.000-07:00

The court recently received two very large electronic filings. Each of the documents was nearly 35 inches by 45 inches!

Apparently the system does not check for document physical dimensions.

Of course, Acrobat scales the document so you can see it on screen, but the header applied by CM/ECF almost vanishes, it is so small

compared to the type in the document itself.

Click this image and see the enormous staple holes!

Boldly Going . . . . to CM/ECF Version 3.1

2008-01-24T14:05:00.000-07:00

The District of Utah will move to CM/ECF version 3.1 on February 2.
Implications:

file Friday February 1st as the system will be down on the 2nd for installation (see the court's home page for more specific information);
filings made SuperBowl Sunday will use the new 3.1 software (but who will be working that day?); and
make sure your computers have Internet Explorer or Firefox browser, as Netscape will not work with version 3.1

Yes, that last point is correct. The long touted Netscape browser, sometimes recommended as the only really compatible browser, will not work with CM/ECF version 3.1.

For prior postings about this version, see The New Look of CM/ECF 3.1; Release 3.1 Set for Summer 2007; Another Version 3.1 Feature (regarding Social Security cases); and Hyperlink Possibilities Expand in CM/ECF 3.1.

Feeling rejected?

2008-01-15T09:38:00.000-07:00

If your PDF is rejected, it may be for one of several reasons. The most frequent is violation of the 3 megabye size limit per PDF file, set in the Administrative Procedures II. C. 2.

In the court, we use Lotus Notes, which gets a Print to PDF button when you install Acrobat Standard. Unfortunately, any PDF file created by this method cannot be filed in CM/ECF. A rather cryptic message appears telling the user the PDF is not "well formed."

The Western District of Washington has listed some other reasons a PDF may be rejected. One reason is password security and another is the use of JavaScript by your PDF creator.

If your PDF contains any password security, it will not be accepted.
If you receive this error message"ERROR: Document contains code which may cause an external action (such as launching an application). This PDF document cannot be accepted."

The reason that PDFs filed in the court cannot contain OpenAction JavaScript commands is because they can be used to track those who view a PDF and to install malware and viruses.

Western Washington's site mentions another potential problem:

Word Perfect and Word files converted to PDF via Acrobat can cause this behavior when Acrobat is set to "High Quality Print"- often the default. In the distiller settings make sure the Default Setting is set to Standard, not "High Quality Print" or "Press Quality". These settings actually add an attachment to the pdf file. To get to this setting, select the Adobe PDF printer, go to Properties, Adobe PDF Settings tab, Adobe PDF conversion settings, Default Settings.

Appellate Courts Move to CM/ECF

2008-01-02T08:43:00.000-07:00

According to the Federal Court Management Report for December 2007, the Eighth Circuit is leading as Courts of Appeal move to CM/ECF.
"The Eighth Circuit began accepting most attorney-filed documents using ECF in June 2007. In less than six months, the court registered over 5,000 attorneys and has had nearly 2,000 attorneys file documents in ECF. No other court has plans to go live on ECF before 2008, but five courts met in St. Louis at the end of November for an ECF Workshop where they reviewed the experience of the 8th Circuit and discussed ECF best practices and lessons learned. Version 2.0 of the appellate software was delivered on schedule on October 1, 2007, and it already has been installed in two of the four courts of appeals. Work has just begun on Version 2.1 which will be released to the courts in October 2008."
The Tenth Circuit has been using CM/ECF internally as its filing system since September 4, 2007. The policy changes for the Tenth Circuit implicated by this change are listed in a document on the court's web site at http://www.ck10.uscourts.gov/downloads/CM_notice_to_counsel.pdf "While this conversion will not involve attorney/litigant filing, it is the first step towards that transition."
In addition, the Tenth Circuit has posted its rules changes necessitated by CM/ECF at http://www.ck10.uscourts.gov/downloads/generalorder-efile.pdf.

PDF Issues

2007-11-28T10:09:00.000-07:00

The court sees strange PDF files occasionally, most often letter size pages scanned to legal size format, making a long blank space at the foot of the page. Sometimes pages are scanned upside down, or sideways. A recent filing had an issue never seen before. This was a "text" PDF file. All pages were present, but only the upper left quarter of each page was showing. The document "properties" showed the size as 3.94 x 5.83 inches! Here is the "properties" box and a sample page.
(click on an image to enlarge)

Keylogging Update

2007-11-21T14:49:00.000-07:00

The threat of keylogging continues and CM/ECF users are not immune. According to a recent internal memo, over 100 PACER and several dozen CM/ECF filer accounts have been compromised by keyloggers this year nationwide. The keylogging is due to hidden software on the computer of the PACER or CM/ECF filer. The federal government monitors apparent keylogging on private accounts which access government computers, and notifies PACER users or CM/ECF filers of the infection on the users' machines, and the fact that their names and passwords (and quite likely their banking and client communications accounts) have been compromised. The Clerk of the Court is also notifed when a CM/ECF filing account has been compromised. It is more than likely that CM/ECF and PACER access are not the goal of these keyloggers -- but that they are pursuing more financially rewarding information.

Computer Malfunctions

2007-11-21T10:30:00.000-07:00

Recent documents filed in court reveal the unfortunate consequences of our reliance on computers.
One filing detailed the loss of a document in process which necessitated the extension of a filing deadline. The filer fortunately had a recent backup so the problem was not as severe as it might have been.

(click to enlarge)
Another filer described futile efforts to recover data, and the narrative also revealed that there was no recent backup. Worse yet, the computer hard drive had all the attorney's time and billing records and email and there was no back up for a three year period. Fortunately, the issue of "excusable neglect" did not have to be decided by the court.

(click to enlarge)

AcrobatDigital Signatures and CM/ECF

2007-10-29T20:30:00.000-07:00

Adobe Acrobat's handy and cool digital signature tool runs into trouble in CM/ECF. The Acrobat digital signature certifies that the docuent is authentic and unmodified since the time the signature is attached. But when CM/ECF attaches a header, the document is modified -- causing the signature to display an error code.

The solution? Don't use Acrobat digital signatures in CM/ECF filed documents.

The New Look of CM/ECF 3.1

2007-10-27T19:20:00.000-07:00

Among new features in CM/ECF version 3.1 is cascading menus. Like the Windows Start menu which branches into sub-menus, the CM/ECF 3.1 menus let you navigate further without moving through so many screens.

Faulty PDF Redacting Whacks FTC

2007-08-15T14:02:00.000-07:00

Unfortunate FTC lawyers failed to use proper redacting techniques for a PDF filing in a court case (1:07-cv-01021-PLF - District of Columbia District Court) filed against Whole Foods proposed purchase of Wild Oats. As is the case with faulty PDF redactions, "the words looked redacted but were actually just electronically shaded black. The words could be searched, copied, pasted and read." According to the Washington Post story, FTC lawyers filed a second version, apparently using proper redaction technique. "The second version of the document was filed using scanned pages of the redacted documents. There is no way to remove the blacked-out portions from the final copy." Acrobat Standard and Professional 8.0 and other PDF compatible products include redaction tools that really work.

Failure to Whitelist Court NEF EMails Not Justified

2007-07-30T11:48:00.000-07:00

A judge in Colorado has sanctioned lawyers for failure to appear at a settlement conference. Their excuse was that they did not receive notice through CM/ECF -- but that was because their IT staff failed to whitelist the email domain from which Notices of Electronic Filing are sent. The judge held that this was not "substantially justified" and imposed attorney's fee and expense sanctions.
This event was described in a Computerworld article. As one blogger says, "The business process of the law firm was not understood by the admin." The essential facts are contained in the judge's order to show cause in Pace v. United Servs. Auto Ass'n, Case No. 05-cv-01562-LTB-MJW, D. Co., 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 49425, dated July 9, 2007. That case cite is from a blog account of the event, where the judge's order is posted.

Steady Progress on E-filer Percentages

2007-07-24T15:05:00.000-07:00

The district continues to make steady progress on reducing the number of non e-filers. Non e-filers require paper notice and impose signficant scanning duties on the court staff. E-filers complain that it is very inconvenient to have a case with a non e-filer because of paper service is required for that attorney.
In December 2006, the number of non e-filers on active cases was 334 but in mid July 2007, it was down to 184. Judges continue to offer assistance and encouragement to attorneys so that they may register as e-filers.

New Tool Eases E-mail to Counsel

2007-06-27T07:10:00.000-07:00

The District of Utah recently added a new tool to CM/ECF for users inside and outside court. It allows easy access to all email addresses in use in a case. The tool is found in UTILITIES, MAILINGS, MAILING INFO FOR A CASE. The screen that appears has all the notice information for a case. This has been helpful for preparation of service certificates, envelopes or labels for notice purposes. Now, it is even more helpful for the many cases in which all counsel are registered e-filers and receive notice by e-mail.

Near the bottom of the information screen, there is a comma delimited list of all email addresses for the case.

And at the bottom of the information screen (just above this sentence), there is a "mailto" hyperlink ("Click here to prepare an email to all email addressees") which will open the user's email program and insert the comma delimited email address list into the email. The screen shot below shows the email that was created by the hyperlink.

Case Evaporates When E-Filer Fails to File Complaint

2007-06-14T07:31:00.000-07:00

An attorney recently suffered the indignity of being the first to have a case number forfeited for failure to electronically submit a complaint. Current Utah CM/ECF procedures allow counsel to submit information in advance of a complaint filing so that a case number may be reserved and a case opened to receive an electronically filed complaint. In this instance, a case number and judge assignment was made on June 6th but the attorney failed, after several notices, to file the complaint. Finally, on June 11th, the case was closed and the attorney was barred from electronically filing complaints in the future.

Non Delivery of NEF Requires Evidentiary Hearing

2007-06-14T07:25:00.000-07:00

An article in the Computer Law Review and Technology Journal analyzes an Eighth Circuit decision holding that a lower court should have considered evidence to rebut the presumption of delivery for a Notice of Electronic Filing. The court held that affidavits presented raised issues of fact that entitled the appellant to an evidentiary hearing. The receipt of the NEF was critical to the issue of appeal timeliness.

Notice of Conventional Filing Does Not "Reserve" Filing Date

2007-03-05T19:50:00.000-07:00

Judge Kimball recently revealed that an attorney was using an e-filed Notice of Conventional Filing to "bookmark" a spot on the docket; stamping document caption pages at the all-night filing box outside the court; and then returning to the court days later to actually deposit the documents in the all-night filing box using the caption cover pages stamped days earlier.

Chronology:
2/16/2007 at 9:53 PM - Notice of Conventional Filing e-filed
2/16/2007 at 10:11 PM - Date stamp on face of documents
2/21/07 (morning) - Documents retrieved by court staff from all-night filing box, found in between other documents bearing 2/20/07 date stamp

The caption pages stamped 2/16/07 were attached to the documents pulled from the all night filing box on February 21st. If they had actually been deposited on the 16th, they would have been pulled from the box on the morning of February 20th, after the Presidents' Day Holiday. But the documents were not in the stack of documents pulled from the box that date. They were pulled from the box the morning of February 21st.
Judge Kimball ordered the documents to be docketed as of February 20th, the day before they were actually found in the all-night filing box, not as of the February 16th date of the face page stamp which was also the date of the electronically filed Notice of Conventional Filing. Judge Kimball also ordered that "counsel for both parties are hereby notified that they are not to electronically file any 'Notice of Conventional Filing' until after the document actually has been filed with the court." (The timing of the Notice is not specifically state in the court's Administrative Procedures.
Judge Kimball also gave notice that serious sanctions would apply to such conduct in the future:
"Accordingly, counsel is hereby notified that, if any such conduct is again observed by court staff, the court will strike the document(s) at issue and therefore will not consider the document(s) in deciding any related motion."
Endnote:
The February 16th Notice of Conventional Filing was itself strange, reciting the documents were conventionally filed January 19th. Review of the record in the case shows another Notice of Conventional Filing was e-filed on January 19th. But the documents referenced in that Notice were not actually docketed until January 23rd, even though they would have been expected to be in the all-night filing box the morning of January 22nd.

Emailing is Not E-filing

2007-02-15T20:42:00.000-07:00

On February 8th, the Tenth Circuit made it clear that emailing is not the same as efiling. The court dismissed the appeal in Le Williamson v. Deluxe Financial, Case No. 05-3312 even thought the Appellant attempted to email a notice of appeal to the clerk.

Le Williamson had thirty days, or until August 5, 2005, to file a timely
notice of appeal. On August 5, Le Williamson apparently attempted to file his
notice of appeal with the district court via e-mail but was unsuccessful. On
August 8, he filed a hard copy of the notice of appeal via a drop box when he
discovered the notice of appeal had not been entered on the district court’s
docket.
Le Williamson argues his untimely filing should be excused because he
timely submitted the notice of appeal by e-mail.Unfortunately for Le Williamson,
a generic “submission by e-mail” is not the same as “filing” for purposes of
Rule 4. To be "filed" within the meaning of Rule 4, the document must be
submitted to the clerk’s office by an approved manner. In the District Court of
Kansas, documents can be submitted directly to the clerk’s office, by drop box,
or electronically as specified by court rules. Under the Administrative
Procedure for Filing, Signing, and Verifying Pleadings and Papers by Electronic
Means in the United States District Court for the District of Kansas in Civil
Cases (Administrative Procedure), "[e]-mailing a document to the clerk’s office
or to the assigned judge does not constitute filing the document."

Data Mining Illustrated

2007-02-13T20:35:00.000-07:00

As reported in http://www.bespacific.com, Justia has launched a powerful list of many recent court filings, including data mined from Utah's CM/ECF system.

(click image to enlarge)

Besides presenting lists of recent court filings, and direct links to PACER, Justia allows a user to search national court filings for parties or case types.

Sealed Civil Motion Docket Entries Will Appear on the Docket

2007-02-08T09:42:00.000-07:00

The Civil Sealed Motion has been changed from a sealed ENTRY to a sealed DOCUMENT. This means that a Notice of Electronic Filing (NEF) will go out to all counsel, but the document itself will only be available to limited court staff. Since the Sealed Motion docket entry will appear on the docket, attorneys will now be able to e-file related documents (memorandums in opposition, replies, etc) and link them to the sealed motion. This was not possible previously.
The Criminal Sealed Motion will remain as a sealed ENTRY. No NEF goes out and it does not appear on the public docket.

Release 3.1 Set for Summer 2007

2007-02-07T15:46:00.000-07:00

CM/ECF version 3.1, which will have many features of interest to chambers and lawyer users, is scheduled for release in June 2007. Among the new features in this version are hyperlinks between documents in a docket. and the ability to print multiple documents. Other features in version 3.1 include cascadiung menus, case pick lists, use of debit cards, availability of certain documents in Social Security Cases, and hyperlinking between documents.

Percentage of Attorney E-Filings Plateaus

2007-02-05T14:06:00.000-07:00

For the past nine months, attorney e-filings have been 30-35% of total court filings. It appears that the percentage of documents filed by attorneys has plateaued at that range. As mentioned previously in this blog, there are many items which cannot be filed by counsel, including notices, minute entries, writs, sealed papers, orders and judgments, and pro se and prisoner papers.

More E-Filer Registrations

2007-02-05T11:44:00.000-07:00

At the end of 2006, the court removed all old email addresses for persons who are not registered e-filers. Many have registered as e-filers simply by virtue of that change, and in some cases, the court has taken a more active role. These file entries show one process that has been followed.

January 17, 2007
ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that within fifteen days all counsel of record in this case who are not registered e-filers in the court's electronic filing system shall register as electronic filers or shall file an affidavit or declaration stating their reasons for not complying. "As of May 1, 2006, all members of the Court's Bar, active and pro hac vice, must electronically file all civil case filings. All criminal case filings by attorneys must be filed electronically as of November 1, 2005." http://www.utd.uscourts.gov/documents/announce8.html
Signed by Judge David Nuffer on January 17, 2007.

January 31, 2007
RESPONSE TO ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE re Order to Show Cause, filed by Plaintiff. [Counsel certified that he was registered and attached a copy of the confirmation of his registration.]

February 5, 2007
NOTICE FROM THE COURT re Order to Show Cause and Response to Order to Show Cause.The response satisifies the order to show cause. The court greatly appreciates the cooperation of counsel.

A New Look in CM/ECF Version 3.1

2007-02-02T11:47:00.000-07:00

District CM/ECF Release 3.1 includes several user interface enhancements to improve common functions, including a new cascading menu system and streamlined case selection.

While it is not as radical as Windows Vista, the cascading menus are a step forward for usability. The effect of the cascade will be to reduce the number of screens that must be navigated before getting to the docketing task at hand.

Similarly, almost every screen with a case number look-up field will be changed to reduce the number of screens presented to the user. All possible case number matches will be displayed on the same screen as the initial look-up field.

Release 3.1 is not currently available but is expected to be released within a few months.

Audio Recordings to Be Posted on Trial Basis?

2007-02-02T11:32:00.000-07:00

At the March 2007 Judicial Conference a proposal will be considered to endorse a pilot project for 6 to 12 months to allow digital audio recordings to be accessible through CM/ECF and to make those audio files available to the public through PACER. Whether audio recordings of court hearings will be available on PACER is therefore at least two years away.

Pay.gov Will Require Security Code

2006-12-28T12:28:00.000-07:00

Beginning February 1, 2007, all district and bankruptcy court CM/ECF users that pay fees through the Pay.gov system will be required to complete the security code field to complete the transaction. The security enhancement was implemented after an erroneous credit card charge appeared on an individual’s statement. A CM/ECF user apparently transposed his or her credit card numbers and also matched the expiration date for the other credit card, so the charge to the other person was approved for payment.

District Upgrade To Version 3.0 To Start New Year

2006-12-28T12:16:00.000-07:00

The District of Utah will upgrade to Version 3.0 of CM/ECF to start the new year. Users will see changes to Notices of Electronic Filing and to initial information screens. Watch the court's CM/ECF newsletter for more details.
Because of the upgrade, CM/ECF will be unavailable Friday, December 29, 2006 from 5:00 a.m to Noon.

Acrobat 8 Includes Redacting and Bates Numbering

2006-12-07T11:14:00.000-07:00

An article by Brett Burney on law.com discusses new features in Acrobat 8, including redaction and Bates numbers. Redaction was previously discussed in this blog.

Don't Plan Critical Docket Review Friday Night

2006-12-07T10:50:00.000-07:00

PACER will be subject to possible interruption Friday December 8th from 7 p.m. MST to 9 p.m. MST. The official announcement states "The transition will have no affect on CM/ECF filers. "

The PACER Service Center (PSC) has scheduled a two hour maintenance window on Friday, December 8 beginning at 9:00 PM ET. The PSC will be upgrading the central authentication servers residing at the two national gateways. The servers authenticate PACER users in Bankruptcy CM/ECF version 3.1, District CM/ECF version 3.0, webABBS and the U.S. Party/Case Index. PACER user authentication may be disrupted for several minutes at different points during the maintenance window.
Customers that experience login problems during the maintenance window can access PACER by utilizing the universal login feature. Customers should be directed to http://ecf.psc.uscourts.gov. This server will not be affected by the upgrade. Once the login and password are accepted, the customer should be directed to the PSC links page at http://pacer.psc.uscourts.gov/psco/cgi-bin/links.pl.
Customers may access any of the sites on that page using the cookie received during login as long as the browser remains open. The transition will have no affect on CM/ECF filers.

Some Courts Report Slow PDF Uploads

2006-11-28T11:23:00.000-07:00

Starting Monday November 27th, some courts reported slow PDF uploads to CM/ECF even for small (40k) filings. Several courts were using CM/ECF version 3.0 but one court reported the issue on 2.5, while another using 3.0 reported no issues. Some wondered if it was due to heavy on-line shoppping on CyberMonday but issues apparenly continue today.

Court Continues to Discourage Large Filings

2006-11-08T10:54:00.000-07:00

The court recently received summary judgment memorandum with 51 attachments, and a total file size of 45 mb for over 200 pages. This is an unusually large size for a filing and an unusually large size per page. The court discourages such large filings because of the time required to download them. This is reflected in the Administrative Procedures:

Where the filing will include 15 or more separately efiled exhibits, the filer shall conventionally file the pleading, or alternatively, reasonably combine the exhibits in electronic format to make a smaller number that fit within the other size constraints of the system. II E. 6.

No single document over three megabytes in size shall be electronically filed without prior leave of the Court. (Any document greater than 200 pages shall be filed conventionally.) II C. 3.

The court sent the following email to this recent filer, typical of those sent when such a large filing is received:

As Technical Manager of the CM/ECF Program, I would like to thank you for your e-filing in our court, which helps contribute to a more efficient Judiciary. The Court is striving to make the e-filing process as efficient as possible, both in terms of you, the filing attorney, and for all parties, attorneys , Judges, and staff, who download and view/print the documents filed. I observed a recent filing of yours which could be improved technically.
Case: x:06cvxx
Document No: xxx
Page size (in kilobytes): 81 - 189k/page (ideal recommended page sizes 20-40k/pg )
Issue: Documents were fairly large, in terms of kilobytes per page.
Recommendation: For text documents of this type, you might consider scanning them at 200 dpi, rather than 300 dpi. This will reduce the size of each document significantly, allowing you to combine more documents into fewer total attachments. Alternatively, if your scanner will support it, Adobe Acrobat Standard has a scanning feature built into it, which is more efficient than some of the other scanners available. It may be that there are other settings that you could check on your scanner, as well, that may result in smaller, more efficiently sized documents, while still preserving clarity and readability.
This is intended as a helpful suggestion and tool to make your E-filing faster, easier, and more effective. If you would like more information or guidance regarding any of this information, please do not hesitate to call me at (801) 524-6105.
Thank you.

Robert Janzen

Courts Enter Contract for Microsoft Office

2006-10-30T20:15:00.000-07:00

The Administrative Office of the United States Courts announced today that it "has entered into a multi-year contract to provide the Microsoft Office Professional office productivity software suite to the judiciary. The Microsoft Office Professional suite includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and several other software applications broadly used in the courts. This centrally funded contract provides the judiciary with immediate rights to the current version of Microsoft Office Professional 2003, as well as Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2007, scheduled for release early next calendar year."
The District of Utah made Microsoft Word available in chambers in early 2006, to facilitate counsel's submission of orders in that format. Microsoft Word predominates in law offices nationally and has proven to be a predominant format in draft orders submitted to chambers by email, under the District of Utah Administrative Procedures. The availability of the entire Microsoft Office suite to all federal courts will further enable courts and counsel to integrate better.
The announcement memo states "Corel WordPerfect will continue to be the judiciary’s standard desktop word processing application."

New CM/ECF CLE Materials Available

2006-10-28T17:37:00.000-07:00

In connection with the annual Federal Bar Association Ronald N. Boyce seminar, and the Utah State Bar Fall Forum, CLE materials related to CM/ECF have been posted on Judge Nuffer's Resource web page. While similar, the materials contain somewhat different tips on working in the electronic environment. The documents are in PDF format and are designed for electronic use, with hyperlinks. In connection with these CLE postings, new flash video demonstrations related to electronic research are also posted on the resource page.

Are Keyloggers Watching You?

2006-10-19T09:13:00.000-07:00

According to a letter sent to clerks of district and bankruptcy courts, the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT), a part of Homeland Security, has notified the Administrative Office of the United States Courts (AOUSC) that a number of user accounts which access PACER and/or CM-ECF systems are infected with keystroke logging programs, also called keyloggers.
Keyloggers are a form of computer software designed to infiltrate or damage a computer system without the owner's knowledge. The software is installed when a user opens an infected e-mail file or through exploitation of a security vulnerability on a system. Keyloggers are usually configured to capture account names and passwords and pass the captured information to a drop-site owned by a hacker. Keyloggers are usually after financial account access.
The AOUSC has notified the affected users of the detected infection on their machines, and the fact that their PACER and/or CM/ECF names and passwords (and quite likely their banking and client communications accounts) have been compromised. Even if you have not received such a notification, it is prudent for all computer users to check all computers which are used for access to accounts of any kind, run an anti-spyware or anti-viral program and follow the advice it provides. To combat the return of a keylogger, the computers that you use should be running up-to-date detection programs and computer operating systems should be running with the latest versions released by the operating system vendor.
Once a computer is infected with malicious software (malware), the only sure method of removing it is to backup all data, and reinstall the operating system and all programs. Once a keyloggger has been removed users must change the PACER and CM/ECF filer passwords, along with all other passwords in use for financial account access, etc. Changing passwords before removing the keylogger or without installing anti-viral and anti-spyware software will not solve the problem.
The court’s PACER and CM/ECF systems are NOT compromised and keylogging has not infected any judiciary servers or client machines.

Court Offers Scanning Hints

2006-10-05T10:02:00.000-07:00

The court monitors the size of PDF documents and notifies filers (including judges!) of oversized filings. While the system will actually block filings over three megabytes (Administrative Procedures II. 3.C.), filings of a few pages may still be unusually large, by reason of scanning or unusual conversion procedures. This is a sample email the court sends:

Dear [Attorney],
As Technical Manager of the CM/ECF Program, I would like to thank you for your e-filing in our court, which helps contribute to a more efficient Judiciary. The Court is striving to make the e-filing process as efficient as possible, both in terms of you, the filing attorney, and for all parties, attorneys , Judges, and staff, who download and view/print the documents filed. I observed a recent filing of yours which could be improved technically.
Case: 2:xxxcvxxx
Document No: 55 (the exhibits)
Page size (in kilobytes): 322 - 763k/page (ideal recommended page sizes 20-40k/pg )
Issue: Documents were scanned in color.
Recommendation: For a text documents of this type, it is recommended to scan in 'black and white' at 200 or 300 dpi, this will reduce the size of the document significantly, and make uploading easier. It will also make it so that you will not need to split up each of the exhibits to make them less than the 3.0 MB per document size limit.
This is intended as a helpful suggestion and tool to make your E-filing faster, easier, and more effective. If you would like more information or guidance regarding any of this information, please do not hesitate to call me at (801) 524-6105.
Thank you.

Robert Janzen US District Court, District of Utah
Unix Systems Manager 350 South Main St.
Voice (801) 524-6105 Room 150
Fax: (801) 526-1160 Salt Lake City, UT 84101
email: robert_janzen@utd.uscourts.gov

No one is denied the opportunity to improve. When I was using a court form to generate an order, Bob checked to see why my one page PDF file was nearly 500K. He found a way to make the data file 90% smaller.

A memorandum recently filed tipped the scales at just over 30 megabytes. The 33 page memo was only 175K, but the 61 pages of exhibits were just under 500K per page. This meant the 7 exhibits had to be split into 15 separate pieces to stay under the 3 mb limit per uploaded document. The document was scanned in 24 bit color which rendered the large file sizes.

Tragically, the document had to be refiled because it was actually a memorandum in support but filed first as an opposing memorandum. When re-filed, all the file sizes were the same. The filer must be very patient to make such large uploads.

PACER Enhancements

2006-10-05T08:42:00.000-07:00

An announcement from the Administrative Office of the US Courts describes new PACER features which will be available in Utah when the upgrade to CM/ECF Version 3.0 is complete, within two months:
User Preferences may be set to require or not require a client cose, and to set a default format for the client code. Customers may choose to turn off viewing transaction receipts. A new Court Information Utility "provides general court information such as hours of operation, court location and phone number, as well as filing information such as the maximum size of PDF files, the court's version of CM/ECF, case flag definitions and more."
Full version 3.0 release notes for PACER users are available.

Missed Opportunities to Make Memoranda Accessible

2006-10-02T09:55:00.000-07:00

More attorneys are using free hyperlink creation tools from Westlaw and Lexis to make all their cited authorities accessible with a click of the mouse. Hyperlinks are greatly appreciated by chambers. However, there are still a few missed opportunities.
First, some documents are converted to PDF in a way that does not preserve the hyperlinks in the PDF version of the memorandum. The hyperlinks are present in the word processing document, but not converted into PDF format when the document is prepared for filing. This may result from using a PDF converter that cannot convert hyperlinks or from improper settings on a PDF converter. The filed document contains blue text and underlines that signal links, but there are no operative links.

In Microsoft Word, the PDF printer will not convert hyperlinks.

Instead, use the special Adobe PDF menu or toolbar buttons to convert Word documents to PDF with hyperlinks.

In WordPerfect, the Publish to PDF settings must be set to convert hyperlinks and bookmarks.

In addition, filers often miss the chance to use a table of contents with internal hyperlinks to the document. Often, these tables are present, but they have not been prepared with hyperlinks or the hyperlinks have not been preserved in the PDF conversion process. Microsoft Word and WordPerfect will automatically create these tables and include hyperlinks so that a table entry can be clicked to navigate to through the memorandum. When these links are present in the PDF version of the document, they assist chambers staff.

Attorney E-Filings Steady

2006-10-02T09:37:00.000-07:00

Attorney e-filings have been steady for several months at just over 30% of all court filings. The clerk's office reports that some documents which could be e-filed are still received in paper, but the majority of documents filed by attorneys are now e-filed. An assessment in December 2005 indicated that attorney e-filing in criminal cases would max out around 25%. This is because of the number of documents in those cases which must be filed by the court. There is more room in civil cases for e-filing by attorneys, but there are still some documents required to be filed in paper to be processed by the docketing staff.

On-line Fee Payments Increase

2006-09-24T16:31:00.000-07:00

Utah is one of 21 district courts accepting fee payments online. In the second quarter of this year, those 21 courts collected $514,152 in fees from 1,874 transactions. The courts are looking forward to version 3.1 of CM/ECF in 2007 which will allow debit cards to be used -- now only credit cards are accepted.
In Utah, over 100 on-line payments have been made, mostly for pro hac vice applications.

Administrative Procedures Updated

2006-09-23T19:00:00.000-07:00

The Administrative Procedures which govern electronic filing in the District of Utah have been updated as of September 22, 2006.

AOL Spam Blocker Strikes NEFs

2006-09-14T15:58:00.000-07:00

Earlier today, courts reported slow or non-delivery of NEFs to some AOL accounts. AOL had reports from their users incorrectly identifying some court email as spam and subsequently blocked e-mails from a limited number of court public IP addresses.
National court technical support contacted AOL technical support and the affected outbound court IP addresses have been added to AOL’s white-list so that all e-mails from U.S. Courts should be able to reach their designated AOL domain recipients.
AOL users who want to check any missed emails from the District of Utah may use the Emails Sent report in CM/ECF.

Request or Motion?

2006-08-29T09:45:00.000-07:00

An attorney submitted a proposed order in August, intending to prod the judge who had not acted on a motion in the case. Apparently, the judge had overlooked the Notice of Electronic Filing (NEF) received on the motion. And since the attorney filed his motion as a request,

the motion did not show on any motions reports. The motions reports are used in chambers to find motions that are pending and ready for decision. If a motion is filed as a request or application it will not appear on motions reports.

In this case, the email to chambers rescued the motion from oblivion.

Attorney Auto Response to E-mail: Return to Sender!

2006-08-11T16:14:00.000-07:00

This auto-response recently arrived at the court, from an attorney who had been sent the court's August CM/ECF Newsletter.

I am unavailable and due to the volume of emails that I receive, do not assume that I will actually read and/or respond to your email. Accordingly, I am not accepting service by email. If you have time sensitive materials, please forward them both to [name and email address redacted] and to [name and email address redacted] and/or telephone them at [phone number redacted]. Thank you for
your cooperation.

The attorney has no active cases, which seems like a good thing.

Attachment Complications

2006-08-11T12:00:00.000-07:00

In a submission for attorneys' fees, a party split its attached billing statement records in three segments to stay within the size limits of the Administrative Procedures. But "[s]omehow one part was filed twice and the third part was not filed." Instead of supporting 133.9 hours the attachments supported 3.9 hours. The submitting party did not pick up on this until the opposing party noted it. The submitting party later explained: "[A]s a result of the electronic filing, and the inability to file one lengthy exhibit as one document, [the exhibit] as filed electronically only contained the first 30 pages of the 51 pages of the total billings . . . ."
The event illustrates the need for careful review of each attachment as it is uploaded. The training classes suggest that as attachment proceeds, the user should right-click the attachment to verify that it is the correct file. See page three of Civil Memoranda training materials. Caution would also suggest that each filing be reviewed when the NEF is received.

Another Version 3.1 Feature

2006-08-08T14:42:00.000-07:00

An announcement today stated that another feature expected in CM/ECF version 3.1 will be that judgments, opinions and orders in Social Security cases will be available to PACER users. Now, the entire Social Security case is not available on PACER due to the personal information contained in such case files.

NEF Change in CM/ECF 3.0

2006-07-29T09:04:00.000-07:00

In CM/ECF versions prior to 3.0, the Notice of Electronic Filing speaks of service prospectively.

2:06-cv-999 Notice will be electronically mailed to:
Richard Dmith (E-Filer) Richard.Dmith@hotmail.com

2:06-cv-999 Notice will be delivered by other means to:
Nan Filer
123 Lost Avenue
Salt Lake City, UT 84101

But in version 3.0, service is recited as having been made, making the NEF a more effective service record. (Service certificates are still required on papers filed with the court.)

2:03-cv-5000 Notice has been electronically mailed to:
Richard W. Dmith (E-Filer) Richard.Dmith@hotmail.com

2:03-cv-5000 Notice has been delivered by other means to:
Nan Filer
123 Lost Avenue
Salt Lake City, UT 84101

Hyperlink Possibilities Expand in CM/ECF 3.1

2006-07-26T10:12:00.000-07:00

According to an internal bulletin from the Administrative Office of the Courts, version 3.1 of district court CM/ECF software will "allow users to include hyperlinks between two or more documents filed in CM/ECF." Current CM/ECF software does not assign a fixed URL address to filed documents and attachments but the appellate CM/ECF software has that ability, soon to be added to the district and bankruptcy CM/ECF software.

"[T]he format of the URL will be standardized and simplified for ease of use and across court types" and will permit use of a page number parameter to direct the reader to a specific page number in the hyperlinked document depending on the reader’s browser. According to the Administrative Office bulletin, this page specific linking is only available if Mozilla Firefox or Netscape browsers are used to access the document. "With the Internet Explorer browser, the document will always open at the first page."

PACER fees will apply when the hyperlinked document is accessed. No release date is set for these future CM/ECF versions. The District of Utah is currently testing version 3.0 and no date is set for its implementation locally.

First Pay.gov Payment in Utah

2006-07-14T10:55:00.000-07:00

The Utah District Court received its first payment through pay.gov at 11:39 am today. Kim, working with Bryon Benevento, paid the filing fee for a Pro Hac Vice admission. The new pro hac vice procedures combined with the pay.gov payment feature should enable quicker access for pro hac attorneys by eliminating paper.

PAY.GOV Implemented

2006-07-11T13:49:00.000-07:00

Starting Monday, July 10, 2006, attorneys are able to pay fees online when e-filing a Notice of Appeal, Motion for Pro Hac Vice and new case opening documents. The fee can be paid with a major credit card using Pay.gov, the U.S. Treasury's Internet Payment Processing Service. Pay.gov will accept Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Diners Club/Carte Blanche and Discover cards.

During these filing processes, CM/ECF will navigate the user through the payment process and after successfully completing the payment process, the user will return to CM/ECF to complete filing. An "Internet Payment History Report" will be available to users through CM/ECF so that these credit card payments may be tracked.

Complete information and instructions are available in pdf format.

CM/ECF Outage Wednesday July 12th 5:30 pm - 7:30 pm

2006-07-11T13:48:00.000-07:00

Due to a GSA project at the courthouse, the District of Utah CM/ECF system will be down from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday July 12, 2006.

Attorneys E-file 24x7

2006-07-11T09:17:00.000-07:00

A study by the district for attorney filings in June 2006 reveals that the heaviest time for attorney electronic filing is in the afternoon, and that filings peak between 4 pm and 5 pm.

There are signficant filings through the evening hours, as well, and some filings at all hours of the night. The court recorded no filings between 4 am and 7 am during the entire month.

Court Excuses Attorney's Failure to Read Order Linked to NEF

2006-06-16T13:26:00.000-07:00

Recognizing that "some attorneys have been having problems understanding the new electronic case filing system," District Judge Dale A. Kimball re-scheduled a case after counsel failed to comply with an order which he did not read. Counsel admitted he received a Notice of Electronic Filing (NEF) that his motion for an extension of time was granted, but he believed that his motion was granted without restriction and that an order would come later in postal mail. He also said he tried "to obtain a copy of the order from the email notification" but was "unable to do so." (Docket no. 98)
Whatever the reason, counsel did not read the order which granted his motion to extend time, and therefore failed to comply with conditions set in the order. Judge Kimball recognized that counsel "could have been genuinely confused about whether an Order was attached to the e-mail notification of electronic filing. This court will give him the benefit of the doubt once." Judge Kimball re-scheduled the case (2:04-cv-01065) in his order, docket no. 125.
If readers are aware of any other decisions addressing CM/ECF issues in the district, please email mj.nuffer@utd.uscourts.gov.

Federal Lawyer Columnist Extols NitroPDF

2006-06-16T07:50:00.000-07:00

Michael J. Tonsing, technology columnist for the Federal Lawyer magazine produced by the Federal Bar Association devoted his May column to NitroPDF. Tonsing says the product, which he bought for less than $70, "is a new, very affordable, fully featured PDF creation and editing product." Like Adobe Acrobat Standard (which lists for $299 per seat) NitroPDF includes a PDF creator, and allows annotating and commenting. Features Tonsing praises include image editing, keyword hyperlink indexing and table of contents page linking. He says the product also includes Bates stamping.
A contrarian view of alternative PDF software is offered by Adobe's Rick Borstein. NitroPDF reviews are posted on the ArtsPDF website.

Attorneys Who Are Not E-Filers Get Special Letter

2006-06-14T16:13:00.000-07:00

Today, several hundred letters were sent to attorneys who are active on cases in the District, but are not registered e-filers. This is the first effort directed personally at counsel who are not registered to e-file. Each letter lists all cases in which the attorney is active counsel. The letter continues:
The overwhelming majority of the court’s bar have complied with the requirement that active counsel register as electronic filers. All counsel on a case are required to be e-filers, even if only one lead attorney files papers. The deadlines for mandatory e-filing (November 1, 2005, for criminal cases and May 1, 2006, for civil cases) are long past. Generous advance notice was provided, and the court provides several avenues for training at no cost, some including CLE credit. The few counsel who are not e-filers impose a burden of paper service on the court and on counsel who comply with the court mandatory e-filing policy.
The letter points out the four ways of filling the prerequisites necessary to e-file (court training, in-firm training, web site training and registration in another court, including bankruptcy court) and encloses a registration form. Recipients are invited to register.
By far most attorneys who are not efilers have one or two cases pending in the court. But there are a few with 5 or 10 or 20 cases. The court will continue to press for compliance with efiling by all counsel.

666 = Y2K

2006-06-07T10:02:00.000-07:00

The reported CM/ECF downtime on 6/6/06 was apparently an echo of the Y2K phenomenon. Just as Y2K fears were anticipated but not realized, the supposed outage yesterday was only a single user issue. In reality, no filings were interrupted, and filings continued throughout the evening.
According to internal court report, "Upon further investigation on the 7th, the attorneys' problem was a DNS problem on their end, and other attorneys were able to docket successfully through the evening of 6/6. In other words, there was no discernible problem with CMECF; however the notice was posted, which, upon investigation the following day proved to have been unnecessary; however it was posted to exercise 'an abundance of caution.' "

Notice to Unregistered Counsel

2006-06-06T17:19:00.000-07:00

June 5th marked the first order to counsel in a case asking them to explain their failure to register as e-filers. The case has over a dozen attorneys, and the few counsel who are not e-filers impose a burden of paper service on those who have complied with the court mandatory e-filing policy. Orders such as this may become more common in the future.

ORDER regarding electronic notice and electronic filing status.
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that within fifteen days all counsel of record in this case who are not registered e-filers in the court's electronic filing system shall register as electronic filers or shall file an affidavit or declaration stating their reasons for not complying. "As of May 1, 2006, all members of the Court's Bar, active and pro hac vice, must electronically file all civil case filings. All criminal case filings by attorneys must be filed electronically as of November 1, 2005." http://www.utd.uscourts.gov/documents/announce8.html

6-6-06 Strikes CM/ECF

2006-06-06T17:08:00.000-07:00

Amidst all the hype about the "666" related date, the court began experiencing some intermittent problems with access to CM/ECF and PACER from the "outside" late today. Attorneys may have problems e-filing documents from approximately 4:30 p.m. this afternoon. As of 5:00 p.m., there was no estimate of a time for the sytem to be fully functional. Attorneys who have called were told to file their time-sensitive documents in paper. The court still maintains a 24 hour filing box on the front courthouse steps.

CM/ECF Downloading Tool - Beta Testers Sought

2006-06-05T13:49:00.000-07:00

Peter Lucas has written a piece of software to automate the downloading of pleadings from the CM/ECF system using the "Notice of Electronic Filing" which is sent via email when a new pleading is filed. He says the software will merge, bookmark, and save pleadings automatically and that the program also works with the Lexis-Nexis File and Serve electronic filing system. He has tested the software with pleadings from 12 districts (both bankruptcy and district courts).
Peter is giving the release version of the software away for free to anyone willing to give it a try in its beta state and provide feedback. A copy can be downloaded at www.digitalofficesystems.com/ezcourt.html System requirements include Microsoft Outlook 2003 and Adobe Acrobat 7 (any version).
Peter's contact information is:
Peter J. Lucas
Appel & Lucas, P.C.
1917 Market Street, Ste A
Denver, CO 80202
1-866-849-8016 fax
303-297-9800 phone
lucasp@appellucas.com

Getting Citation Hyperlinks into an Existing PDF Document

2006-06-05T11:23:00.000-07:00

You receive a memorandum from another party and want to streamline your Westlaw or Lexis research. Unfortunately, the submitting party did not provide it to you in electronic form, or if it is electronic, they did not include hyperlinks. West and Lexis provide free tools to automatically generate hyperlinks in WordPerfect and Microsoft Word documents. If you had received the document in WordPerfect or Microsoft Word format, you could run the citation generators described at http://www.utd.uscourts.gov/judges/nuffer_resources.htm#hyperlinks. But if the document is a PDF document, how can you generate citation hyperlinks so that a mouse click takes you to your research service? Or, even worse, if someone has delivered a paper memorandum, how can you get the convenience of clicking into the cited authorities?
PDF Document: Open the PDF document inside WordPerfect X3, which can draw the text out of PDF documents. Then run CiteLink. Or save the PDF document in RTF or Microsoft Word format using Adobe Acrobat Standard or Professional, open the document in Microsoft Word or Word Perfect, and then run CiteLink.
Paper Document: Scan the paper document to word processing format and then run CiteLink. Or scan the paper document to PDF format using and run the OCR (Optical Character Recognition) option as you scan. Then, take the steps described above for a PDF document.

Report - First Month of Fully Mandatory E-Filing

2006-06-01T09:32:00.000-07:00

May 2006 was the first month in which e-filing was mandatory for all attorneys in all cases. During the month, the percentage of filings by attorneys increased dramatically, to over 30% of all court filings, and the more attorneys registered as efilers than in any prior month.

(click on image for larger view)

Ten Courts of Appeals Begin CM/ECF Implementation

2006-05-30T13:57:00.000-07:00

"Ten of the 13 courts of appeals are participating in the Judiciary’s national rollout of the Case Management/Electronic Case Files (CM/ECF) system . . . [T]courts of appeals are still in the implementation stage, which began in 2005. During this time, functions have been added and kinks subtracted. Says Gary Bowden, chief of the Administrative Office’s Appellate Court and Circuit Administration Division, 'The 10 courts of appeals are making steady progress and we expect the first [appellate] courts to go live with the CM/ECF system by late 2006 or early 2007.' "
-From The Third Branch, May 2006

NARA Approves of Disposal of Documents Scanned Into CM/ECF

2006-05-23T20:03:00.000-07:00

Since the District of Utah began scanning documents into CM/ECF, it has maintained most of those papers in chronological boxes. Thus, there is a box for every filing day in the court archive. See the May 4, 2005, posting.
As of May 12, 2006, the National Archives has agreed that the courts need not retain "paper documents scanned in their entirety into the AOUSC Case Management/Electronic Case File (CM/ECF) system" unless a local policy requires retention of the paper document. The Administrative Procedures provide that some papers are not scanned while others are scanned and retained perpetually, such as documents signed by criminal defendants, or criminal judgments. These items will be retained by the court, but the routine matters filed in paper may be destroyed if scanned in their entirety into CM/ECF. Of course, the court does not receive official paper copies of direct electronic filings by counsel.

New Training Resource on Hyperlinks

2006-05-13T08:03:00.000-07:00

In addition to the other resources on hyperlinks to authorities cited in memoranda found on Judge Nuffer's Resource Page, there is now a flash video presentation explaining how hyperlinks work and how to create them. It requires the Flash player.

CM/ECF Version 3.0 Enhancements

2006-05-04T09:06:00.000-07:00

CM/ECF Version 3.0 will be introduced to court management and IT staff May 10th. After testing, it will be implemented in Utah. Among anticipated major changes are:

Court Information on the CM/ECF welcome screen and the Utilities menu which displays the following information: the court name, the version of CM/ECF the court is currently running, the date the court went live on CM/ECF, the file size limitation for documents, the court's address, phone number, e-mail address, and hours of operation, and the PACER Service Center's address, phone number, and email address.

Restricted access to ex parte motions:
The enhanced software will accommodate the filing of ex parte motions. Now, notice of ex parte motions filed by attorneys in CM is given to all parties. Version 3.0 will limit access to ex parte motions to court staff, judges, and the attorneys for the filing party.

Attorney E-Filing Continues at High Rate

2006-05-04T07:38:00.000-07:00

On May 1, 2006, E-filing became mandatory for all counsel in all cases, civil and criminal. Some documents must still be paper filed under the Administrative Procedures -II. F. 4. But generally, counsel are now required to electronically file almost everything they produce. The percentage of documents e-filed by counsel since May 1 has been impressive.

(click on chart for larger image)

A high percentage of documents will still be docketed by court staff because minute entries, notices of hearing, orders, and case opening documents are filed in the court, by court staff. Also, as court staff exercise their quality control function a docket entry is created with each error correction. All these docket entries "count" in the total entries by court users. But the percentage of docket entries created by attorney users in early May is very impressive.

Mandatory E-Filing In All Cases on One Year Anniversary

2006-05-02T14:02:00.000-07:00

On May 1, 2006, the one year anniversary of the implementation of CM/ECF in the District of Utah, electronic filing became mandatory in all cases for almost all filers. Some documents and filers are excluded from mandatory e-filing, but the exceptions are few. On May 1st, the percentage of docketed documents that were docketed by counsel was very high! Of 342 documents filed, 163 were filed by out-of-court users. Over 47% of documents docketed that day were e-filed by counsel or their staff.

Judge Makes Another E-Filing Gaffe

2006-05-01T10:50:00.000-07:00

Today marked another e-filing gaffe for Judge Nuffer as he self-docketed a document related to criminal pre-trial supervision in a totally unrelated civil case. The error was one that can be very common. Because CM/ECF remembers the last case viewed, when moving from one case to the next, it is important to check that the current case is the intended case for docketing.
As a frequent filer, Judge Nuffer has made several e-filing errors. Fortunately, capable staff at the court are usually able to clarify the confused docket, though the evidence of the errors usually remains in place.

Redaction Warnings!

2006-05-01T07:08:00.000-07:00

This timely and important entry is provided by Al Petrofsky on April 29, 2006:

Your Honor,

With the impending flood of inexperienced electronic filers starting with the rule change on Monday, I would like to suggest that you write something on your blog at utd-cmecf.blogspot.com about the pitfalls of redacting electronic documents.

As an example of how easily things can go wrong, yesterday [a document was filed] in [a case filed in the District of Utah] that failed to properly redact anything. Although white block-out rectangles were placed over some pieces of text, the text can easily be recovered. (One method to do so, using the standard Adobe PDF viewer, is to select the redacted text with the mouse, copy it to the system clipboard, and then paste it into a word processor.)

Here is a selection of relevant references, from spooks, nerds, and clerks:

1. "Redacting with Confidence: How to Safely Publish Sanitized
Reports Converted From Word to PDF", National Security Agency, Report #I333-015R-2005, February 2, 2006. http://www.nsa.gov/snac/vtechrep/I333-TR-015R-2005.PDF

2. "Redaction of Confidential Information in Electronic Documents", Adobe Systems (creators of the PDF format), Technical Note, 2006. http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/en/acrobat/Redaction.pdf

3. "Redaction of Information", United States District Court, District of Northern
California, Web site tip, May 2, 2005. http://ecf.cand.uscourts.gov/cand/faq/tips/redacting.htm

Yours,
Al Petrofsky

As the listed articles suggest, PDF redaction is not an intuitive process. Because of the multi-layer content of a PDF file (image and text and metadata), redaction is not a WYSIWYG process. Just like any other new tool, there are hurdles that will be overcome as we learn to work with PDF editing programs, but in the meantime inadvertent errors will occur.

The following graphic illustrates the ability to select text in a text based PDF even though it is concealed from sight by white rectangle graphics. The text remains part of the document unless effective redaction techniques are used. [This is a sample document, not intended by the submitter to be redacted; not the document referred to in the Petrofsky submission.] (click on the image for a larger view)

Here is the copied and pasted text, which includes text concealed from sight:
4.) In negotiations with Google, this request was later narrowed to a "multi-stage random" sampling of one million URLs in Google's indexed database. As represented to the Court at oral argument, the Government now seeks only 50,000 URLs from Google's search index. Second, the government also initially sought "[a]ll queries that have been entered on your company's search engine between June 1, 2005 and July 31, 2005 inclusive." (Subpoena at 4.) Following further negotiations with Google, the Government narrowed this request to all queries that have been entered on the Google search engine during a one-week period. During the course of the present Miscellaneous Action, the Government further restricted the scope of its request, and now represents that it only requires 5,000 entries from Google's query log in order to meet its discovery needs.

Chambers Survey on Electronic Research Services

2006-04-26T11:57:00.000-07:00

In connection with the ability of CM/ECF documents to contain hyperlinks to research services, so that cited authorities are only a click away, the court conducted an informal survey of chambers. Responses were received from each chambers. Westlaw is in use in all chambers. Two or three chambers make secondary use of Lexis.
Importantly, chambers have access to Lexis and Westlaw passwords, so citation hyperlinks in either service are acceptable and appreciated. The Administrative Procedures II. C. 1. permit "citations of legal authority in standard citation format [to] be hyperlinked to recognized electronic research services, such as Westlaw, Lexis/Nexis, Findlaw and official government sites. " Further, hyperlinks may refer internally to an electronically file document, so that a table of contents or authorities may contain hyperlinks. Other hyperlinks are not currently permitted, and "[h]yperlinks to cited legal authority may not replace standard citation format."