18th Judicial District Court

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Judicial branch announces plan to restore district court information systems

Appellate efiling, case management systems to be restored after district court systems

TOPEKA—The Kansas judicial branch tentatively plans to restore most information systems used by district courts in 104 Kansas counties by year-end, including systems used to process cases and receive electronically filed documents.

The Kansas Supreme Court announced last week that the judiciary’s information systems were temporarily incapacitated by a cyberattack.
The recovery plan announced today follows best practices for safely restoring and managing information systems following this type of security incident.

The timeline, which projects work to be accomplished over the next several weeks, is also subject to change. 
“To help us prepare our recovery timeline, we sought input from cybersecurity incident recovery experts,” said Chief Justice Marla Luckert. “While we believe our estimate is realistic, we must be prepared for fluctuations as we move forward with our plan." 

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Judicial branch working on phased recovery of its information systems

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TOPEKA—

The Public Access Service Center and the District Court Service Center have been operating for one week at the Judicial Center in Topeka.  The service centers are staffed by district court clerks, trial court clerks, chief court services officers (CSOs), CSOs, secretaries, administrative assistants, court reporters and Office of Judicial Administration employees.

 

The Public Access Service Center allows visitors to search district court case information by appointment.  Attorneys and members of the public can visit the Public Access Service Center appointment request form to schedule an appointment.  Click here for more information about the Public Access Service Center.  Since November 7, 240 people have made 569 appointments to use the Public Access Service Center.

 

The District Court Service Center provides remote support to district courts.  Staff send data and records to fill district court needs, including court schedules, routine reports and documents used for hearings or court transcripts.  Access also allows courts to process drivers’ license reinstatements and abstracts of conviction.  The center also provides CSOs access to documents they need to prepare presentence investigation reports. 

 

The District Court Service Center can be reached by emailing timestudy@kscourts.org.  Instructions for submitting a request to the District Court Service Center can be found in the OJA Resources folder.

 

These service centers are positive gains for the entire judicial branch and those our courts serve.  Please join me in thanking the team leading these efforts.  I would also like to extend a tremendous thanks to the 55 employees from 13 Kansas judicial districts who are staffing the service centers.

 

We recognize these are incremental steps in safely getting the judicial branch back to normal operations.  Please know we are working as quickly as possible while focusing on safety and security.  We appreciate your patience and hard work to serve your communities during this time.

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Supreme Court issues new order about court operations 

 

TOPEKA—The Kansas Supreme Court issued Administrative Order 2023-CC-074 today confirming clerk offices in the appellate courts and all district courts—except the court in Johnson County—remain unable receive electronic filings at this time.

Courts are open and operating, but clerks cannot receive electronic filings or electronic payments. All filings must be on paper or by fax. Paper filings can be hand delivered or sent by mail.

The order declares clerk offices inaccessible because the electronic filing systems in those courts are unavailable. This allows a party to seek relief from a court if their filing is untimely.

“This order and other information on our website will guide court users on our operations while our information systems are offline,” said Chief Justice Marla Luckert. “We continue to serve our communities, but we are using different methods until our systems are restored.”

The Kansas Courts eFiling system has been offline since the judicial branch experienced a security incident late last week. The security incident affected several systems used daily by courts statewide, including the efiling system attorneys use to file documents in cases, the case management systems district and appellate courts use to process cases, and others.

The Office of Judicial Administration has added information to the judicial branch website to help court users while court systems are offline. The Court systems security incident page will be updated as new information becomes available. It includes links to information pages for attorneys and the public who need to interact with courts.

Information circulating publicly about court systems being down two weeks emanates from continuity of operations discussions in the Office of Judicial Administration. By applying a timeline, the office could focus on court and court user needs and how to meet them while its systems are offline.

The Office of Judicial Administration is working with experts from several sources to find out what happened in the security incident, how it happened, and how far it reached. Until those questions are answered, the Office of Judicial Administration can’t predict when the systems will be brought back online.

The network issues faced by the judicial branch interrupted user access to several online systems, including:

• Kansas Courts eFiling, which accepts electronically filed documents.

• Kansas Protection Order Portal, which accepts electronically filed documents.

• Kansas District Court Public Access Portal, which allows searching district court case information.

• Appellate Case Inquiry System, which allows searching appellate court case information.

• Kansas Attorney Registration, which allows searching for an attorney by name or bar number.

• Kansas online marriage license application. Persons can still apply, but the application will not be sent to a district court for processing through the efiling system.

• Central Payment Center, which operates in the Office of Judicial Administration, will not be able to process disbursements on behalf of district courts.

• Kansas eCourt case management system, which district courts use to process cases.

 

Prior news releases on security incident:

Supreme Court says state courts will stay open, operate on paper while security incident examined (10-13-23)
Supreme Court issues order in response to network security incident (10-12-23)
Network issues affecting access to some court systems (10-12-23)

 

 

 

 

THE 18th JUDICIAL DISTRICT WANTS YOUR INPUT!

IS THERE SOMETHING WE CAN IMPROVE? WE WANT TO KNOW.

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​        Open your camera to scan this QR code and take a survey on how we can serve YOU better.

1. Survey Submissions are ANONYMOUS

2. Your survey results are sent to the District Court Administrator Joni Wilson.

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18th Judicial District Court Mission Statement: Providing Fair and Just Service in a
Timely and Courteous Manner.

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Thank you for your time

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