We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to improve access to justice — let’s not squander it

Modernized, more accessible courts throughout the United States could be one of the great silver linings of the COVID-19 pandemic. But it’s going to take more than Zoom hearings and emailed PDFs to make that so. To make good on the lessons we learned over the past three years, and to truly improve access to justice for all, courts need to keep innovating and implementing technology that supports universal access to remote hearings and streamlined handling of digital evidence.

In Arizona, the dream of the digital court traces back a generation, when the court record began to transition from paper to digital. Over the past decade, I have had the great fortune to see both the transformative potential and the challenges involved as Arizona courts have worked to develop and put into use remote hearing and digital evidence tools. The initiative gained momentum in 2017, with the formation of the Arizona Task Force on Court Management of Digital Evidence. The effort then catapulted forward during the pandemic, when Arizona courts implemented, out of necessity, digital alternatives to in-person hearings and paper exhibits.

Today, I’m sharing some highlights from that experience to further advance the progress we’ve made and provide a playbook for other court systems that are likely experiencing many of the same challenges.

From crisis to opportunity

As a starting point, it’s important to look back at where we were in March 2020, when the pandemic hit hard. We had been looking at the logistics of a digital evidence court concept for years. The pandemic, however, forced our hand, requiring Arizona courts to remain acutely attentive to the balance between promoting health and safety for all and maintaining meaningful access to justice. And courts had to implement these required changes in days and weeks, rather than years or decades. As a result of that intense sprint, the pandemic became the great digital accelerator for the courts.

In late 2020, the Arizona Judicial Council approved a pilot with Thomson Reuters to create a cloud-based digital evidence system, which quickly expanded statewide. Even then, the thought of shifting thousands of hearings to remote video conferences and relying entirely on digital evidence was a futuristic idea. However, after a short period of intense and hard work — and building on what worked (and what didn’t) — we were amazed at the results.

While many courts elsewhere were paralyzed, amassing massive backlogs, Arizona courts remained open and saw enhanced access to justice with the use of digital hearings. In the Maricopa County Justice Courts, for example, the rate of defendants failing to appear in initial eviction hearings was close to 40 percent pre-COVID (when personal appearances were required). We saw that number drop significantly when remote appearances were allowed, averaging less than 25 percent during 2022. Through surveying of litigants, attorneys and other court participants, we found that 92 percent cited reduced travel time, 76 percent cited taking less time off work and 72 percent cited reduced costs as the immediate benefits of remote hearings.

Addressing real-world challenges

To put this all in perspective, consider a typical day in the life of a Superior Court judge in Maricopa County, Ariz., serving on a juvenile rotation. There may be 30 or more hearings where the judge meets with parents at risk of losing custody of their children, or those who have recently won back custody, to monitor progress. Before virtual hearings were allowed, that meant these parents — many of whom were already struggling — had to get time off work, find child care, travel to court, wait to meet with the judge and, if the schedule went too long, be re-scheduled.

Allowing a remote option instantly removed barriers that made it so hard for people to access the court. That advance doesn’t mean our work is done. Far from it — if we truly want to learn and continue to improve access to justice, we need to address the digital divide that is keeping digital court solutions from reaching their full potential. Other challenges include training, education and refinement. All that, in turn, means working with state, local and federal government and the private sector to ensure access to high-speed internet, along with funding for technology to enhance access to justice for all.

We must keep moving forward

Importantly, it also means developing a set of operational, administrative and technological standards that make it possible for court systems to widely implement new technologies. According to a recent study, that is not happening today. Almost 75 percent of courts still do not use digital evidence management systems, despite the enormous potential for this technology for all involved in the court system. That’s true even though two-thirds of those who do not have such a system in place believe their court would benefit from it. Moreover, 40 percent of court systems say they are still relying on now-dated tools, like thumb drives or DVDs, for digital evidence to be used in court.

We have come too far and learned too much to go back to the way things were before the pandemic. And we have done too much to stop halfway on this digital transformation. It is not enough to have simply set up video conferencing capabilities during the pandemic and stop there, or even worse, quickly pivot back to in-person hearings in the post-pandemic world. Digital innovation has not stopped, and will continue to evolve. With new AI-powered tools that convert handwriting, audio and video evidence into searchable, admissible text; streamlined video conferencing capabilities; user-friendly document sharing tools; and other advances, we have a chance to improve the processes courts have been using for decades.

Technology helped us survive the pandemic. By continuing to lean into that spirit of innovation, we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to significantly enhance access to justice. Let’s not squander it.

Samuel A. Thumma has served on the Arizona Court of Appeals, Division One, since 2012, serving as chief judge for two years ending in 2019. Previously, he served as a judge on the Arizona Superior Court, Maricopa County, for nearly five years, presiding over criminal and juvenile matters, including nearly 250 trials. The views expressed are solely those of the author.