Summary: Which of the 94 United States federal trial courts were most efficient in the September 2014 fiscal year?

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (AO) has developed a way to measure the production and efficiency of federal trial courts.

  

What

Where

Search Jobs

The AO used hours spent on the bench, hours in trials, and the number of criminal and civil trials each court conducted throughout the September 2014 fiscal year.

The Miami court (Southern District of Florida) was #1 in trial hours, #2 in hours on the bench, #5 in criminal trials and #15 in civil trials, and was the most productive overall.

The “America’s Most Productive” placements do not include individual court-specific information to measure their productivity. The research shows that the average judge spent 346 hours on the bench, 182.7 hours in trial, and conducted 3.5 criminal trials, and four civil trials in 2014.

Their disclaimer is that the numbers are likely inflated, due to the fact that they do not consider the work of senior U.S. district judges, who typically work fewer hours in lieu of retirement.

Florida’s Southern District Chief Judge, K. Michael Moore, said that “civil cases that go to trial in his court take about 16 months from start to finish, while cases that settle prior to trial resolve themselves, on average, in six months,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

The number of criminal and civil cases filed per judge in the Southern District was 695. The national average is 533. Judge Moore said his goal is to promote a setting where lawyers know that, “you’re going to have to complete your task in a defined amount of time.” He added, “Holding lawyers to a trial date is the biggest incentive for them to do the work that they need to do. The days of judges sitting back and being passive participants in the case-management system are gone.”

Coming in second is the California Eastern District. The court ranked #6 in bench hours, #3 in trial hours, #16 in criminal trials, and #8 in civil trials.

Here is the entire top 10 list:

1. Southern District of Florida, #1 in trial hours, #2 in hours on the bench, #5 in criminal trials and #15 in civil trials.
2. California Eastern District, #6 in bench hours, #3 in trial hours, #16 in criminal trials, and #8 in civil trials.
3. Eastern District of New York, #3 in bench hours, #5 in trial hours, #5 in criminal hours, and #9 in civil trials.
4. Western District of New York, #4 in bench hours, #4 in trial hours, #14 in criminal hours, and #19 in civil trials.
5. Southern District of New York, #1 in bench hours, #2 in trial hours, #27 in criminal hours, and #18 in civil trials.
6. District of Idaho, #7 in bench hours, #7 in trial hours, #17 in criminal trials, and #23 in civil trials.
7. Central District of Illinois, #11 in bench hours, #24 in trial hours, #14 in criminal trials, and #6 in civil trials.
8. Middle District of Louisiana, #15 in bench hours, #6 in trial hours, #30 in criminal hours, and #10 in civil trials.
9. District of Colorado, #16 in bench hours, #10 in trial hours, #36 in criminal hours, and #3 in civil trials.
10. Middle District of Florida, #31 in bench hours, #8 trial hours, #13 in criminal hours, #11 in civil trials.

Source: http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2015/04/06/which-federal-trial-court-is-most-productive/