Montana Court Records

Montana is moving its courts to a new centralized case system, and public records become available in the District Court Public Access Portal and the Courts of Limited Jurisdiction Public Access Portal as each court joins.

The Montana Supreme Court docket, opinions and briefs are searchable on the Judicial Branch site, and the court locator gives contacts for every court.

Montana dissolutions are district court cases filed with the Clerk of District Court in the county where the petitioner or the respondent has lived for the 90 days before filing. The court's dissolution packet tells filers that everything filed with the court may be viewed by the public unless a law, rule or court order protects it, and the public portal rules exclude only statutorily confidential cases, cases with a minor party and sealed cases. The sworn Preliminary and Final Declarations of Disclosure under MCA 40-4-252 and 40-4-253, and the Disclosure of Income and Expenses form MP-510, are served on the other spouse rather than filed, and the preliminary declaration may be filed only on the court's order, so the public file holds the petition, the Proposed Property Distribution form MP-500 with its list of real property, vehicles, bank accounts, retirement accounts and debts, the child support calculation and the decree.

The District Court Public Access Portal shows party indexes, new filings and the register of actions for participating courts, with no documents; the full case record is available at each courthouse during its posted hours. The Montana asset search page explains what the filed property form and decree show.