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California Court Cases

To find copies of court documents, or judge's decisions, researchers should understand the structure of California's court system. There are three types of courts in California: trial courts, appellate courts and the Supreme Court.

Trial courts:

These are courts at the county or city level, usually called superior or municipal courts. These cases are not published. To obtain case information, you must contact the court clerk for the particular court in which the case was filed. For Sacramento County Superior Court, some case information is available on the Internet and on microfiche:

At the web site of the Sacramento County Superior Court Case Index, the following indexes are available:

The following court indexes are available on microfiche at the 3rd floor Reference Desk, Central Library (Fiche CoSac Co 862):

Appellate courts:

These are intermediate level state appellate courts. When a person files an appeal in his or her case from the county level, the case goes to an appellate court within their geographic region. For example, cases appealed in the Sacramento area generally go to the Third Appellate District Court. The opinions in these cases are published on the court's website and in the California Appellate Reports --- available at the Sacramento County Public Law Library and the California State Law Library.

California Supreme Court:

This is the highest level state appellate court, also known as the court of last resort in California. When appeals fail at the intermediate level, they sometimes move on to the California Supreme Court. California Supreme Court opinions are published on the court's website and in the California Reports --- also available at the Sacramento County Public Law Library and the California State Law Library.

Some courts will publish case decisions on their website. To access the California Court of Appeals and the California Supreme Court, see the California Courts web site.

The California State Law Library and the Sacramento County Public Law Library have large collections for legal research. For more in depth research and reference assistance you should visit these libraries:

California State Law Library (http://www.library.ca.gov/)

914 Capitol Mall
Sacramento, CA 95814
(916) 654-0158

Sacramento County Public Law Library (http://www.saclaw.lib.ca.us)
813 Sixth Street, First Floor
Sacramento, CA 95814
(916) 874-6011