A wire tray sitting atop a counter, located on the ground floor of the Polk County Courthouse, had a very important role in the judicial system: To ensure journalists and the public had immediate access to new civil petitions.
With the dawn of electronic filing, the humble tray was replaced by a virtual filing process that took away the traditional instant access. Instead, those interested in the filings must wait for a “processing” phase to finish up, often delaying access at least until the day after filing.
The change is the subject of a lawsuit filed by Courthouse News and Lee Enterprises, one of the country’s largest newspaper publishers, Friday in federal court. It asserts a First Amendment right to access to new civil petitions filed in Iowa state courts.
