How to Find Out a Court Date in South Carolina

If an individual in South Carolina loses information about their court date, there are other ways to find it. They’ll need to know what court they’re scheduled to appear in before they contact the respective clerk of court online or by phone.

If a South Carolina resident has a court date regarding anything from traffic tickets to child support hearings to criminal cases, they can find find information regarding court dates online or by contacting the court’s office. All courts keep court records through either the clerk of the court of appeals or the clerk of the state supreme court.

Court records in South Carolina are public records.

When trying to find out information about a court case, the first thing an individual must do is identify the court that the case will be heard in. South Carolina has two types of courts – appellate courts and trial courts.

Under the umbrella of trial courts are:

• Circuit court
• Family court
• Magistrate court
• Municipal court
• Probate court

South Carolina appellate courts consist of the state Court of Appeals and Supreme Court.

The individual will next contact the record custodian of that particular court. For example, trial court records are kept by county court clerks, and appellate court records are kept by the clerk of the court of appeals and the clerk of the state supreme court. South Carolina courts can be contacted using the following information, including mailing addresses.

The clerk of court will not give out any information on a court case unless the requester can provide some information regarding it. Typically, the names of the parties or the court case number are needed to access of court records.

Depending on the court and the county, some requesters may need to pay a small fee to the clerk of court for the search.

The South Carolina court system also allows the public to search for this information through its Case Search and Search Opinions portals on the state’s Judicial Branch website by using case number or name-based searches.

South Carolina court case numbers are a combination of unique digits and letters identifying the year, court and county where the case is filed. They are assigned by a clerk’s office at the time of filing the initiating documents.

Case numbers help interested parties monitor the progress of a trial and allows them to access court documents.

As court records are public records, if an individual needs a case number, they can contact the county clerk of court where the case was filed or use the state’s Case Record Search online portal. They'll need to input certain details, like names of the involved parties before accessing the number.

Through third-party websites, users can search nationally for information about court cases and can be useful sources when looking for multiple records. To use a third-party site, a person usually needs to input information such as the name of the person they’re looking for and that person's last known address, including city, county and state.

However, third-party sites are not government-sponsored entities and so are not always accurate or up to date. They may also require a small fee, typically an online payment via credit card.