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The Probate Courts' Administrative Order 2013-1 (effective May 2, 2013): the County Clerk must ensure fourteen categories of court records — sealed records, mental-illness records, medical and psychiatric certificates, TRE 902(10)(a) medical records, inventories, accounts, annual reports, investigator and visitor reports, death and birth certificates, identification-document copies, guardianship cover sheets, and court-designated records — are not published via the Internet, for open cases and cases closed less than seven years, without restricting party/counsel electronic access or other lawful public access.
Texas > Dallas County > all three Statutory Probate Courts — Clerk record-publication practice in probate, guardianship, and mental-illness proceedings
ORDER: effective May 2, 2013, the statutory probate judges "adopt the following Administrative Order concerning publication of court records on the Internet: It is hereby ORDERED that the County Clerk shall take all necessary steps to ensure that the following categories of court records are not published via the Internet or other electronic means: (a) any records sealed pursuant to court order; (b) all court records in mental illness proceedings; (c) medical and psychiatric certificates, letters or reports submitted in connection with guardianship proceedings, including any amendments or supplements; (d) medical records filed with the Clerk pursuant to Texas Rule of Evidence 902(10)(a); (e) inventories, appraisements and lists of claims, including any amendments or supplements; (f) annual and final accounts, including any amendments or supplements (e.g., amended accounts, verification of funds on deposit, etc.); (g) annual reports of the guardian of the person, including any amendments or supplements; (h) court investigator reports, including any exhibits and amendments or supplements; (i) court visitor reports, including any exhibits and amendments or supplements; (j) death certificates; (k) birth certificates, whether original, delayed or amended; (l) court records containing copies of driver's licenses, state-issued personal identification cards, Medicare cards, Medicaid cards or passports; (m) any Guardianship Cover Sheet; and (n) any court record or category of court records identified in a court order as a record that should not be published via the Internet or other electronic means." SCOPE: "This Order applies to open and active cases and cases that have been closed for less than seven (7) years. Nothing in this Order is intended to prevent the Clerk from enabling parties or their counsel of record to have electronic access to any court record. Further, nothing in this Order is intended to otherwise restrict public access to any court record, except as provided by other law."
Reviewer note: Own-site instrument composed by vision (image-only scan rendered and read 2026-08-28; custody sha in the crawl ledger); signed by the 2013-era bench (Judges Brenda Hull Thompson, Chris Wilmoth, and Michael E. Miller) — recorded historically; the order remains posted in the courts' general-orders library as operative Clerk direction.
Tenth (10th) Court of Appeals — Standing Order No. 1, as registered in the statewide TOPICs local-rules registry (posted 01/01/2023). The operative requirements are quoted verbatim; the registered document is the controlling text.
Tenth (10th) Court of Appeals — Standing Order No. 2, as registered in the statewide TOPICs local-rules registry (posted 01/01/2023). The operative requirements are quoted verbatim; the registered document is the controlling text.