Court Recording and Access to Justice
Like other courts across the nation, Cook County is seeing increasing numbers of self-represented parties in the courts. At the same time that litigants are finding it harder to pay for legal services, Cook County has a projected budget deficit of $152 million for 2014, which has resulted in a reduction in the number of court reporters provided in Cook County courtrooms. This presents an access to justice issue: with no court reporter at the trial court level—and no means to hire a private court reporter—many pro se litigants have no record of proceedings.
Without an acceptable record, pro se litigants have no means of verifying their understanding of prior hearings and no means of drawing the court’s attention to what happened at earlier court dates. Most importantly, without an official record, pro se litigants may be precluded from making an appeal. Without a record of proceedings, the appellate court cannot review the trial court’s actions.
Illinois Supreme Court Rules permit “bystander’s reports” to stand in place of a record where no court reporter was present. Unfortunately, court rules are rarely known to pro se litigants and can be misunderstood by people unfamiliar with the process. The rule, however, hints at a solution to the problem: digital recording devices in courtrooms.
Digital recording devices have already been installed in some Cook County courts. This effort began as a pilot program, and has since expanded to juvenile justice and child protective courtrooms. More recording devices are needed to ensure access to justice for all parties, including pro se litigants, regardless of which court they appear in.
Audio recording has been in place in the federal courts for years, and other jurisdictions have adopted audio recording in courtrooms as a solution to the problem. In 2012, an independent Blue Ribbon Commission, formed by the Kansas Supreme Court, recommended that the Court “should. . .strongly encourage [district courts and counties] to use audio equipment in order to preserve a record in the event a court reporter is not available in the courtroom.” In Utah, all state courtrooms “are equipped with digital recording devices that store the audio and video record of proceedings on the court’s computer network. A roster of certified transcribers, composed mostly of former court reporters, now prepares timely transcripts from the digital recordings.” In fact, nearly half the states in the U.S. are transitioning from stenographic court reporters to producing the courtroom record and transcript by persons who monitor digital audio recording equipment.
Installing digital audio recording devices today would be a cost-effective step towards enhancing public confidence in the judiciary and ensuring access to justice for all; however any proposal to introduce recording devices should focus on filling in the gaps—making recording devices available in those proceedings where no court reporters are available, as opposed to replacing court reporters and eliminating those jobs. Therefore a strategic rollout is needed, with individual courtrooms being carefully selected on an as-needed basis.