Data mining, which formed the basis for the current report was conducted through public access toPACER,as permitted by law, in over 20 US district courts, US bankruptcy courts, and US courts of appeals.
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Some of the individual cases, which were examined as part of the study, were identifiedthrough methods, which were developed for rapid screening of cases in the various courts, to identifycases that were deemed at high risk of perversion, and were therefore selected for further examination.Other cases were identified through direct alerts by individuals, who were parties to the cases. Most of the cases involved litigations where individuals, who were plaintiffs, filed complaints for protection of civil rights, or complaints alleging wrongdoing by large financial institutions. Court records wereexamined in the individual cases, to determine whether court minutes, orders, and judgments wereverified and authenticated in a valid manner.
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Since public access was found to be universally deniedto the authentication counterparts, in some of the cases, repeat attempts were made over months, asdescribed below, to gain access to the authentication records, through written requests, as well as repeatpersonal appearances at the offices of the clerks of some of the courts. In particular instances, wherecredible evidence was found that records provided through PACER were false and misleading, lackingverification and/or authentication, but displayed as “entered”, written requests were filed with theclerks and presiding judges of the US district courts to investigate such records and initiate correctiveactions.Additionally, local rules of courts, general orders, and CM/ECF users manuals were downloadedthrough routine web browsing of the web pages of the various courts. Court rules, general orders, andusers manuals were examined to determine whether the courts published clear and unambiguous rulesestablishing the courts’ new digital procedures. When no clear and unambiguous published rules werefound, requests were forwarded in some cases to the clerks and the chief judges to disclose the newrules of the courts