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The district judges' standing order that the sponsoring party must offer evidence in a format the court of appeals can accept: text documents as text-searchable, unencrypted PDFs converted directly where possible (scans OCR'd); document images at 300 dpi black and white; photographs at not less than 2,048 × 1,536 pixels; separator pages where the exhibit number is not on the image; audio files no larger than 100 MB and video no larger than 2 GB, in a format VLC or Windows Media Player supports, containing only the offered segments; and the sponsoring party must supply a compliant copy if the appellate court cannot open the exhibit.
Texas > Denton County > the district courts — every party offering documentary, photographic, audio or video exhibits.
[Letterhead: Denton County District Courts - Sherry Shipman, 16th District Court; Steve Burgess, 158th District Court; Brody Shanklin, 211th District Court; Bruce McFarling, 362nd District Court; Brent Hill, 367th District Court; Karen Alexander, 393rd District Court; Jim Johnson, 431st District Court; Tiffany Haertling, 442nd District Court; Lee Ann Breading, 462nd District Court; Derbha Jones, 467th District Court; Michael Dickens, 477th District Court; Crystal Levonius, 481st District Court; seal of the State of Texas] [File stamp: FILED FOR RECORD, FEB 27 2025, District Clerk, Denton County, Texas (partly legible)] STANDING ORDER REGARDING EVIDENCE When introducing evidence, the Court orders that the sponsoring party of the evidence shall ensure it is in a format that may be uploaded and accepted by the appropriate court of appeals and their guidelines. Text Documents. Each computer file of a text document must be prepared in text-searchable Portable Document Format (PDF), compatible with the latest version of Adobe Reader. The computer file must not be password-protected, encrypted, or protected by rights management. Because scanning creates larger file sizes with images of lesser quality, scanning must be avoided when possible. To the extent possible, each text document must be converted directly into a PDF file using Adobe Acrobat, the word processing program’s PDF conversion utility, or another software program. Exhibits, however, may be scanned if necessary. Any scanned materials must be made searchable using optical-character-recognition software, such as Adobe Acrobat. Scanned Documents. Images of documents must be included within the computer file as images scanned in black and white with a resolution of 300 dots per inch (dpi). Photographs. Photographic images other than documents (e.g., photos of physical exhibits) must be included within the computer file as images with a resolution of not less than 2,048 x 1,536 pixels (approximately 3 megapixels). Higher resolutions are not encouraged. If a full color rendition is necessary, color depth should be between 12-bit and 18-bit. Otherwise, grayscale images are encouraged. Photographs may be captured directly with a digital camera or scanned from a photographic print. Separator Pages. If an exhibit number is not on the exhibit image, there must be a page preceding the image to show the exhibit number. Audio/Video Files. Audio files must not exceed 100 MB. Video files must not exceed 2 GB. Data compression is encouraged, though the submitter must assure that the video and audio content have sufficient quality. The files should not be password-protected, encrypted, or protected by rights management. If the recording is too long to fit in one file, it may be broken into multiple files. An audio/video recording must be included in the record in a format supported by VLC media player (VideoLAN Organization) or Windows media player (Microsoft). JCIT Technology Standards §3.2. If a video file is not supported by at least one of the media players listed above, the file must be converted to another format supported by at least one media player listed. Only segments offered as an exhibit can be on the audio or video media. (i.e., a DVD of jail phone calls with 50 calls, if only certain calls are being offered, copy only those calls onto a separate disk and offer that disk as an exhibit, not all 50 calls). If at any time in the future the case is on appeal and the court of appeals cannot open the exhibit that was offered, the sponsoring party that offered the exhibit will be responsible to provide the court reporter with the exhibit that is in the acceptable format. Signed this the February 27, 2025 [handwritten] [signature] JUDGE SHERRY SHIPMAN, 16th District Court [signature] JUDGE JIM JOHNSON, 431st District Court [signature] JUDGE STEVE BURGESS, 158th District Court [signature] JUDGE TIFFANY HAERTLING, 442nd District Court [signature] JUDGE BRODY SHANKLIN, 211th District Court [signature] JUDGE LEE ANN BREADING, 462nd District Court [signature] JUDGE BRUCE MCFARLING, 362nd District Court [signature] JUDGE DERBHA JONES, 467th District Court [signature] JUDGE BRENT HILL, 367th District Court [signature] JUDGE MICHAEL DICKENS, 477th District Court [signature] JUDGE KAREN ALEXANDER, 393rd District Court [signature] JUDGE CRYSTAL LEVONIUS, 481st District Court
"When introducing evidence, the Court orders that the sponsoring party of the evidence shall ensure it is in a format that may be uploaded and accepted by the appropriate court of appeals and their guidelines. Text Documents. Each computer file of a text document must be prepared in text-searchable Portable Document Format (PDF), compatible with the latest version of Adobe Reader. The computer fil
Reviewer note: Text-layer registration (2 pp, 2,987 chars) read in full 2026-09-06; quoted verbatim; the print carries the twelve judges' letterhead and signatures without a legible date — effective date left open, registration date Feb. 28, 2025. Composed benchpath-ajr8-denton. County-site receipt(s) in custody 2026-09-06: https://www.dentoncounty.gov/DocumentCenter/View/7181/Standing-Order-Regarding-Evidence-effective-May-1-2023-PDF (May 2023 print (prior bench) edition); https://www.dentoncounty.gov/DocumentCenter/View/5993/Standing-Order-Regarding-Evidence-PDF (identical edition). [RECOMPOSED 2026-09-21 (corpus-0920 P7, digital-layer lane): the full text of the registered file (sha256 d46796baca1c..., 2 pages) replaces the earlier 1,864-character abstract. Method: pypdfium2 text layer reflowed page-aware, cross-checked word-by-word against PyMuPDF (1 substantive difference(s), 1 page-furniture), owner-corpus candidate sentences 100% (11/11) matched, 0 running header/footer line(s) removed, no U+FFFD/U+FFFE/form-feed debris. NOT yet checked page by page against the render, so confidence is medium with an open re-verification task; flip to high when a reviewer has read every page against the PDF. benchpath-tx-corpus0920-p7-2026-09-21] [BY-EYE CHECK 2026-09-21 (corpus-0920 P11): every page of the registered file (sha256 d46796baca1c..., 2 page(s)) read against the rendered PDF; file-stamp, caption and signature-block defects of the text layer corrected from the render; confidence lifted to high. benchpath-tx-corpus0920-p11-2026-09-21]
1 verbatim requirement on exhibits in BETSY BENSON's division.
4 verbatim requirements on exhibits & evidence.
1 verbatim requirement on exhibits & evidence.