How to look up a court case in Alaska
Alaska's public case index is called CourtView. It's free, it covers superior and district court cases statewide, and it takes about a minute once you know its quirks.
Where to search
Trial court cases, tickets, and citations: records.courts.alaska.gov. Appeals: the appellate records site. Both are linked from the court system's Search Cases page.
Searching
You can search three ways — case number, party name, or ticket number. For name searches, the court's CourtView guide suggests trying multiple spellings, a first initial instead of a full first name, and common nicknames.
Case numbers follow a pattern — for example, 3AN-12-00001CR: the court location (3AN is Anchorage), the filing year, a five-digit sequence, and the case type (CR criminal, CI civil, PR probate, and so on).
What a case page shows
Each case has tabs for case details, Events (scheduled hearings), the docket, and financials. Party addresses and Social Security numbers are never displayed. CourtView shows the index — for copies of actual documents, ask the clerk at the court where the case was filed using the court's records request form (TF-311).
What you won't find
- Confidential case types are not online at all: delinquency, child in need of aid, adoption, mental health and alcohol commitments, emancipation, medical emergency, and minor settlement cases, per the court's CourtView guide.
- Removed criminal cases. By law (AS 22.35.030), a criminal case is removed from CourtView 60 days after all charges end in acquittal or dismissal (with some exceptions), and court rules exclude other cases such as set-aside convictions. There's even a form (TF-810) to request removal of a qualifying case.
- Old cases. Records before 1990 aren't reliably in CourtView.
One more official caveat, verbatim: a CourtView search "is NOT a criminal history records check" — those come from the Department of Public Safety, not the courts.
Checking for hearings instead?
If what you really want to know is whether a hearing is happening today or tomorrow, that's what the daily calendars are for — see our guide to finding out if you have court, or search today's calendars here for free. We're unofficial; CourtView and the clerk are the authoritative record.