Over the past three years, state legislatures have introduced a large influx of bills addressing the need to protect judges, court staff, and their families. In 2024 alone, more than 60 pieces of legislation were introduced and discussed across 21 states, with 10 becoming law as of April 2024. While the specifics surrounding each initiative differ, five elements appear in most of these bills — all focused on protecting the release and use of personally identifiable information of judges and court staff.
1. Who is covered? Some legislative efforts are specifically limited to state court judges, while others are broader in coverage. For example, Delaware’s H.B. 230 of 2021 limited its provisions to specifically named active, formerly active, or retired state judicial officers and their families as specified elsewhere in the statute.1 Others, such as Missouri’s Judicial Privacy Act,2 cover federal judges and their families as well as prosecutors. Several states have also sought to provide protections to court and clerk staff. Florida, which already had an existing statute covering judges in the state,3 expanded those protections to court staff4 and staff of the independently elected clerk of the court.5
2. What state/local agencies are covered? For laws preventing government entities from releasing information regarding covered persons, the level of specificity varies widely. In 2022, Nebraska acted to include judges in an existing law that withholds from the public information held by the county assessor and register of deeds.6 By contrast, Idaho’s 2023 law more broadly covers every “public agency,” effectively including all Idaho state and local agencies.7
3. What information may not be shared by the state/local agency? State laws differ in defining personally identifiable information and/or generally the records and information subject to restrictions. Some laws broadly prohibit the release of any documentation or records about the covered judicial officer, staffer, or their families. Others designate specific data elements, of which home or residential addresses are by far the most common. Additional data elements may, or may not, be covered by such laws.
4. Who notifies the public office/official possessing the public record that they may no longer release the personal information? Typically, the judge or protected person must notify the government agency that they are covered and therefore the protected information may no longer be released. Several states have laws allowing some other government official to do this on the judge’s behalf. For example, Missouri’s new Judicial Privacy Act8 offers three options. First, the judge may send a written request directly to the government agency, person, business, or association. Second, the judge can file a written request with the clerk of the Missouri Supreme Court or the clerk’s designee to notify government agencies. Third, Missouri’s judiciary has created a website that allows state and federal judges the ability to make such a request.9
5. Does the law also prohibit posting/publication by third parties? Several of these laws prohibit the publication or distribution of information regarding judges by third parties.
Some legislation provides for civil remedies for public disclosure of personally identifiable information. For example, the Oklahoma Judicial Security and Privacy Act of 202310 provides that “no person, business, or association shall publicly post or publicly display on the Internet covered information of an at-risk individual or immediate family if the at-risk individual has made a written request to that person, business, or association to not disclose the covered information of the at-risk individual or immediate family.” Judges and others may submit a written request to the third party to have the information removed within 72 hours. The law also allows the judge or their immediate family to seek injunctive or declaratory relief to remedy violations, including a fine of $4,000 and an award of court costs and reasonable attorney fees.
In addition, Maryland’s Judge Andrew F. Wilkinson Judicial Security Act provides an example of possible criminal penalties.11 The law is named for a Maryland circuit judge killed at his home in 2023 by a party in a divorce case over which he had presided.12 Signed on May 9, 2024, the law provides in operative part that an individual may not knowingly publish the personal information of a protected individual if the person knows or reasonably should know that publishing the personal information poses an imminent and serious threat to the protected individual, and the publishing of the personal information results in an assault in any degree, harassment, trespass, or malicious destruction of property. An individual who violates this section is guilty of a misdemeanor and, on conviction, is subject to imprisonment not exceeding 18 months or a fine not exceeding $5,000, or both.
Running parallel to these efforts to protect personally identifiable information have been efforts to safeguard judges and court staff in other ways:
For more information on judicial security or to track other legislation affecting the courts, visit www.ncsc.org/gaveltogavel. While there, sign up for the weekly newsletter published during state legislative sessions.
William Raftery is a senior knowledge and information services analyst with the National Center for States Courts in Williamsburg, Va. His current work includes research on legislative-judicial relations, judicial selection, judicial conduct, and court security. He is the editor of Gavel to Gavel, a weekly review of legislation in all 50 states affecting the courts.
