Hawaii Court Records

Hawaii Court Record Lookup

Hawaii HI court records are public documents and therefore available by performing a Hawaii court records search to anyone who requests them, with limitations: some cases with particularly sensitive information such as the names of victims, or information about minors, is withheld for confidentiality.

Judicial Districts

There are four judicial districts in Hawaii, and each has family, district, and circuit courts. Family courts, along with tax courts, and land court, handle a limited scope of issues, including Hawaii child support and custody cases.

Mentioned above Hawaii courthouses are the lowest level of trial court, with jurisdiction over traffic matters, civil disputes valued under $40,000, small claims cases under $5,000 in value, and criminal misdemeanors. Criminal cases that require a trial are moved to circuit court. There were about 54,000 cases filed in a recent year, split almost evenly between civil and criminal matters. At the same time, there were 413,000 traffic cases filed. These Hawaii court records online are available by performing Hawaii court case lookup.

Circuit courts handle the major criminal trials, appeals of administrative agency decisions, and civil cases valued at more than $25,000. Probate court duties are part of the circuit court’s jurisdiction, including guardianships and cases involving real property. There were more than 17,500 cases filed in circuit court in a recent year, with over 70 percent of them being civil matters. Criminal cases can be found through Hawaii criminal records search online tools.

Appeals Courts

Six judges sit in panels of three to hear disputed decisions from lower courts. Justices dispose of more than 600 cases per year from over 850 filed, wich can be accessed via Hawaii court record lookup.

The state supreme court is the highest judicial body in the state. It is comprised of five justices with jurisdiction over the state bar, many state administrative offices, and consults on the constitutionality of state laws.

Federal Courts

Those who declare bankruptcy or who are involved in class action suits involving more than one state will find their cases in U.S. District Court, for which there is at least one district in each state. These Hawaii courthouses handle federal law violations and cases that involve more than one state. 

Hawaii Notable Court Cases

A farmer fined for spilling produce on a Hawaiian highway disputed the charges all the way to the state supreme court. When a police officer saw lettuce or cabbage leaves littering a highway near Hilo, he stopped the only truck nearby that was hauling similar freight and fined the driver for spilling part of his cargo on the road. In court the driver said he'd gone back to pick up any spilled vegetables but didn't find them, surmising the leaves had blown off the highway or were run over and would decompose naturally without need for removal. A district court judge sided with the police, saying that the truck driver hadn't tried hard enough to go back and pick up the spilled vegetables, so the driver's fine of $250 was upheld. However the Supreme Court reviewed the case and determined that there was an exemption from the spilled cargo law for agricultural products, and that the driver's determination that a few leaves of cabbage weren't worth running across a highway to retrieve constituted a reasonable attempt to recover the spilled goods. Therefore the supreme court overturned the district court's decision and the fine was reimbursed.

A $1.4 billion project to build a giant telescope atop Mauna Kea, Hawaii's tallest peak, has been delayed by environmentalists and others who say the project is a violation of a sacred place. The project has been controversial since construction started in early 2015, inspiring protests and threats to block construction. In December 2015 the state Supreme Court invalidated the building permit, saying that the Hawaii Board of Land and Natural Resources approved the permit before hearing from those who opposed it. There are more than a dozen other observatories on the mountaintop.