Court cases up 42.3 percent here
Jackson County District Court’s caseload in 2024 was up by almost 1,000 cases from 2023, according to statistics for the court provided District Court Clerk Amy Entrikin.
Annual court figures provided by Entrikin showed that county court personnel handled a total of 3,201 court cases during the past year, up 42.3 percent or 951 cases in all from the court’s total 2023 caseload of 2,250.
Most of that increase came from the total number of criminal court cases — including felony and misdemeanor criminal filings, juvenile court filings and traffic tickets. The 2024 criminal caseload totaled 2,169 cases, up 622 from the court’s 2023 total of 1,547 cases.
Felony criminal filings were up from 242 in 2023 to 275 in 2024, while misdemeanor filings were up from 238 in 2023 to 296 in 2024 and traffic ticket totals jumped from 889 in 2023 to 1,132 in 2024. Juvenile filings and fish and game numbers were down, however, as juvenile court cases decreased from 18 in 2023 to 17 in 2024 and fish and game tickets dropped from six in 2023 to two in 2024.
On the civil side, total court filings increased from 539 in 2023 to 835 in 2024, with much of that increase due to boosts in limited action civil cases, mainly involving debt collections and rental property disputes, and state tax warrants. Limited civil cases rose from 243 in 2023 to 402 in 2024, while state tax warrants totaled 104 in 2023 and 203 in 2024.
General civil court cases, including mortgage foreclosures, automobile torts and other contract disputes, rose from 44 in 2023 to 48 in 2024, while small claims cases rose from nine in 2023 to 11 in 2024 and miscellaneous civil cases rose from 29 in 2023 to 49 in 2024.
Domestic court cases also increased during 2024, when a total of 105 overall cases — including divorce filings, petitions to establish paternity and set child support — were filed, up from 90 in 2023. The total included 29 protection from abuse filings and 20 protection from stalking filings, compared with 2023’s total of 23 protection from abuse filings and six protection from stalking filings.
The domestic cases were part of the “family court” total in the annual court report, which totaled 136 cases in 2024 and 118 cases in 2023. The total included eight adoptions in 2024, compared with five in 2023, and 23 juvenile care cases in 2024, unchanged from the previous year.
Other court totals for 2024 and comparisons with 2023 included:
• Probate filings: 61 in 2024, 46 in 2023.
• Marriage licenses: 84 in 2024, 80 in 2023.
• Personal property tax: 36 in 2024, 29 in 2023.
• Statutory bonds: one in 2024, four in 2023.
Jackson County District Court is part of Kansas’ Second Judicial District, which also includes Jefferson, Pottawatomie and Wabaunsee counties.
