South Dakota Court Records

To begin, add a court record or view a list of locations and resources for South Dakota court records.

Historically, the South Dakota court records have been made available for public viewing unless any requested records had been previously categorized as confidential and exempt from public examination. The concept underlying this practice relates to the philosophy that when the court records of South Dakota are open to public inspection, the interest of both the government and the public are better served.

While all residents have access to South Dakota court records, there are specific instances where clerk staff and court staff may be provided with a higher level of access than members of the general public at large. Confidential information in any court records of South Dakota such as those generally found in adoption records or juvenile records are not accessible but the public and can only be accessed by the appropriate clerk staff that maintains those records.

In the event that only certain items of information within a court record are not permitted to public viewing, those items will be omitted from partially released records.