2007 Weighted Caseload Measures Now Available 
History. The Judicial Administration Committee of the Indiana Judicial Conference began work in 1993 on a weighted caseload measurement system to establish a uniform statewide method for comparing trial court caseloads. The committee employed a consultant in 1994, and over the next two years collected and analyzed data provided by trial court judges and historic case files. Judicial officers from around the state were asked to participate in the study, and more than 36,000 case related timed events were recorded. The judicial officers who participated in the study were representative of counties of all sizes, and included judges, magistrates, referees, and commissioners.
In 2002, the Judicial Administration Committee revisited the weights to provide further accuracy to the weighting. The Committee evaluated and included additional categories including Murder (MR); A, B, and C felonies (FA, FB, FC); Mortgage Foreclosure (MF); and Civil Collections (CC).
The data. Indiana’s weighted caseload measurements are based on new case filings. The weighted caseload study asked judicial officers to track the time they spent on case-related activities such as: prejudgment hearings, trial preparation, plea/admissions, bench trials, settlements, jury trials, opinions, orders, sentencing/disposition, post judgment hearings, and research. These actual times were then multiplied by an occurrence factor based on the number of times that particular activity typically occurs in that particular case category. For example, a prejudgment hearing in a felony case lasted an average of 8.77 minutes, and occurred an average of 5.82 times per filed felony case. Thus, the number of minutes attributable to prejudgment hearings in felony cases came to 51 minutes. Twenty-five case categories were examined, with each category requiring an average number of minutes of judicial time to complete. The time demands ranged from a felony (155 minutes) to an infraction (3 minutes). The minute averages were then multiplied by the number of new case filings in that category for a particular court. Based on the caseload study, it was determined that a judicial officer has an average of 80,640 minutes available during a calendar year.
Application of the data. The use of any measurement system must include an understanding of the variables which impact the statistical results. Examples of variables which may affect such results are jury trial rates, bench trial rates, and specialization of a particular court. The number of support staff assigned to a court also impacts the court’s ability to handle cases. Because this method of analysis is based on averages, short time frames should never be viewed in isolation. Longer periods of time such as a quarter or a year provide a more realistic picture of the court’s operations. The following chart contains the weighted factors by case category. |
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