{"id":37565,"date":"2026-08-11T00:57:30","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T19:57:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=37565"},"modified":"2026-08-11T00:57:30","modified_gmt":"2026-08-10T19:57:30","slug":"california-supreme-court-oks-electronic-recording-in-some-civil-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=37565","title":{"rendered":"California Supreme Court OKs electronic recording in some civil cases"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ca-times.brightspotcdn.com\/dims4\/default\/0081f6d\/2147483647\/strip\/false\/crop\/7612x5077+0+0\/resize\/1500x1000!\/quality\/75\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Ff9%2F49%2Fbceea6e04de08ac166208d051831%2F1560286-me-court-reporter-renaissance-klb-17.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<div data-element=\"story-body\" data-subscriber-content=\"\">\n<p>The California Supreme Court ruled Monday that electronic recording is allowed in civil cases when the court cannot <a class=\"link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/california\/story\/2026-07-06\/california-court-reporter-transcript-case\">provide a reporter<\/a> to make a transcript and parties can\u2019t afford to hire one, finding that a record of such hearings was \u201cpresupposed under California law.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Until now, recording court proceedings was prohibited in most such cases, requiring a licensed reporter to be present in order take down each word that was spoken for the official record. A shortage of professional stenographers in local court systems \u2014 combined with the high cost of hiring one privately \u2014 has meant that many civil hearings go without a verbatim record of what was said, making it difficult for parties to appeal. <\/p>\n<p>Reform advocates have said the problem is especially acute in proceedings that involve allegations of domestic violence and other types of family court disputes. A recent report from the California Access to Justice Commission estimated more than a million hearings went unrecorded in a single year. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe continued failure of the superior courts to provide indigent litigants with a means of obtaining an official verbatim record deprives them of \u2018meaningful access to the judicial process\u2019,\u201d Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero wrote for the court. <\/p>\n<p>Criminal court proceedings and some types of civil hearings still will require a court reporter to make a transcript. <\/p>\n<p>Although the suit originally was brought by the Family Violence Appellate Project on behalf of domestic violence survivors and other vulnerable civil litigants, the case quickly became a proxy fight between the state\u2019s largest public sector union and its sprawling court systems. <\/p>\n<p>Thousands of people could preserve their right to appeal if the courts simply switched on recording equipment they\u2019ve already installed for hearings where no court reporter is available, advocates argued.<\/p>\n<p>But such a move could undermine California\u2019s years-long effort to rebuild the court reporter profession after it was gutted amid the state\u2019s judicial budget crisis in 2012, labor leaders said. <\/p>\n<p>At oral arguments  this summer, lawyers for the state\u2019s court system urged the justices to green-light electronic recording, saying they\u2019d already done everything in their power to fix the problem.<\/p>\n<p>Lawyers for Service Employees International Union, which represents court reporters, pleaded with the justices not to, saying the courts themselves were to blame for the reporter shortage. <\/p>\n<p>Monday\u2019s ruling sought to sidestep that dispute. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe need not in this proceeding investigate the various causes of the courts\u2019 inability to comply with [previous holdings] or assign blame for the unfortunate circumstances in which indigent litigants find themselves,\u201d Guerrero wrote. \u201cIt is sufficient to recognize that, whatever the cause, courts are frequently unable to provide indigent litigants with the means to obtain an official verbatim record.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The court extended its decision to \u201cany litigant who cannot afford to pay a private reporter\u201d \u2014 a group that would include most parties in most civil cases across the state. <\/p>\n<p>Court reporters say only a human being can referee a hearing in real time and guarantee an accurate verbatim transcript at the end of it. <\/p>\n<p>The high court ruled there simply aren\u2019t enough of them available, and that thousands of litigants cannot be asked to sacrifice their right to an appeal while more are trained \u2014 especially in cases where \u201cfundamental rights and liberty interests\u201d such as child custody and conservatorship are at stake. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs a technical matter, the services of a court reporter are not necessary to create an accurate and reliable verbatim record of trial court proceedings,\u201d Guerrero ruled. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The California Supreme Court ruled Monday that electronic recording is allowed in civil cases when the court cannot provide a reporter to make a transcript and parties can\u2019t afford to hire one, finding that a record of such hearings was \u201cpresupposed under California law.\u201d Until now, recording court proceedings was prohibited in most such cases,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37566,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ca-times.brightspotcdn.com\/dims4\/default\/1a2dbe1\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/7612x3996+0+540\/resize\/1200x630!\/quality\/75\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Ff9%2F49%2Fbceea6e04de08ac166208d051831%2F1560286-me-court-reporter-renaissance-klb-17.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37565","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-hub"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37565"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37565\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37565"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}