The Justice Services Online (“JSO”) Court Case Search Tool (“Tool”) has been expanded to include certain Ontario Court of Justice (“OCJ”) criminal court case information, effective March 21, 2022.
The Tool was launched for the Superior Court of Justice (“SCJ”) in August 2020 to facilitate and improve access to basic court case information. The Tool allows anyone with a valid JSO account to conduct province-wide searches for certain SCJ criminal and civil court case information, including future court dates and appearance types. The expansion of the Tool permits users to search case information about active criminal cases in the OCJ (excluding youth cases) and SCJ (youth cases are initialized).
Active cases are those where:
- A future court date has been scheduled;
- There has been a court date within the past seven (7) days; or
- A bench warrant has been issued within the past five (5) years.
Both active and completed SCJ civil cases continue to be available in the Tool to assist
with the completion of remote litigation searches.
For your general information, searches may be conducted by entering either the last or business name of the accused or litigant, or the case number, in full or in part (it is not required that both be entered). A list of up to fifty cases will then be generated. To narrow a search, users may enter the court location or first name of the accused or litigant, or for OCJ searches only, the accused person’s middle initial or year of birth. The case information available through the Tool includes:
- Case title;
- Case number;
- Court location;
- Next event/appearance type and date, if scheduled;
- Whether a publication ban has been ordered in the case;
- OCJ cases only: Date on which the Information was sworn;
- SCJ criminal cases only: Name of the legal representative and the date the accused was committed to stand trial in the SCJ; and
- SCJ civil cases only: Name of the legal representative, claim amount, date the case was opened and the most recent order type/date.
Users may still need to contact the court location where the matter was, or is, being heard if they are unable to find the information they are seeking, or they are seeking information about a case that is excluded from the Tool. Excluded cases include youth cases in the OCJ, older criminal cases in the OCJ and SCJ, and cases subject to a statutory or court-ordered access restriction.
The Tool is available at https://www.ontario.ca/page/search-court-cases-online.
Any questions about this initiative may be directed to Vaia Pappas, Director, Operational Support Branch at 416-326-2514.