Court Records Scraper - Federal Dockets & Case Law (PACER Alternative)

Pull US court records without a PACER account: federal dockets AND case-law opinions in one Actor, exported straight to CSV or JSON.

What it does

This court records scraper searches US federal court dockets and published case-law opinions through the official CourtListener / RECAP public API and returns clean, normalized records. It works as a free PACER alternative for teams that need structured litigation data without per-page PACER fees. Run it in two modes from a single Actor: dockets mode pulls RECAP federal case records (parties, judges, law firms, causes), and opinions mode pulls case law with reporter citations and precedential status. Filter by keyword, court, and date window, then export to CSV, JSON, or Excel, or wire it into your own pipeline via the Apify API. Because it covers both federal dockets and court opinions, it doubles as a litigation data scraper, a court opinions scraper, and a court docket monitoring tool.

Who it's for

• Legal tech and litigation intelligence teams building case databases and analytics
• Law firms running due diligence and conflict / party checks
• Journalists and investigative reporters tracking court activity
• Academic and legal researchers assembling case-law and citation datasets
• Compliance, risk, and litigation-finance analysts monitoring new filings

What you get / Output

Every record is normalized to consistent fields. Availability of some fields depends on the mode (dockets vs. opinions) and what the source publishes for a given case.

Field	Description
type	Record type (docket or opinion)
caseName	Full case / matter name
court	Court name
courtId	CourtListener court identifier (e.g. scotus, cand, nysd)
docketNumber	Docket number for the case
dateFiled	Date the case or opinion was filed
dateTerminated	Date the case was terminated (dockets)
dateArgued	Date the case was argued (where available)
judge	Assigned or authoring judge
cause	Legal cause of action
natureOfSuit	Nature of suit classification
jurisdictionType	Jurisdiction type
citation	Reporter citation(s) for opinions
status	Precedential / case status
attorneys	Counsel of record (where available)
firm	Law firm(s) associated with the case (where available)
url	Source link to the record on CourtListener

Input / How to query

Configure a run with these inputs:

• searchType - choose the mode: dockets (RECAP federal cases with parties, judges, firms, causes) or opinions (published case law with citations and precedential status).
• keyword - full-text query, e.g. a company name, data breach, or patent infringement. Leave empty to browse the newest records with filters only.
• court - restrict to one CourtListener court by ID, e.g. scotus (Supreme Court), cand (N.D. Cal.), nysd (S.D.N.Y.), dcd (D.D.C.). Leave empty for all courts.
• filedSince - only records filed on or after this date (YYYY-MM-DD). Ideal for weekly monitoring.
• filedUntil - only records filed on or before this date (YYYY-MM-DD).
• orderBy - sort results, e.g. dateFiled desc (newest first) or dateFiled asc (oldest first).
• maxResults - upper bound on records returned per run.

Example use cases

• Track lawsuits against a company - set searchType=dockets, keyword="Acme Corp", orderBy=dateFiled desc to surface the newest federal cases naming that party.
• Weekly new-filings monitor - schedule a run with filedSince set to the past week and a court (e.g. nysd) to capture fresh litigation in a jurisdiction you care about.
• Build a case-law dataset - set searchType=opinions to export published opinions with their reporter citations and precedential status for research.
• Due-diligence conflict check - run keyword searches on parties and counsel across all courts, then export to CSV for review before onboarding a client or closing a deal.
• Topic-based litigation intelligence - search data breach or patent infringement to feed a compliance or risk dashboard with structured docket metadata.

Recurring use / scheduling

This Actor is built for court docket monitoring on a schedule. Use Apify Schedules to run it daily or weekly with a rolling filedSince date so each run captures only newly filed cases and opinions. Point runs at the same named dataset to accumulate a growing corpus over time, or keep runs separate and dedupe downstream on url or docketNumber, which are stable identifiers for each record. Pair scheduling with Apify integrations (webhooks, Zapier, Make, Slack, or email) to get alerts whenever new records match your keyword or court.

FAQ

How do I get court case data without paying PACER fees?

Run this Actor. It pulls federal case records from the CourtListener RECAP archive, a free public source, so you get structured docket data without a PACER account or per-page fees.

How can I scrape federal court dockets from CourtListener?

Set searchType=dockets, add a keyword and optional court / date filters, then run. You get normalized docket records with case name, docket number, court, judge, cause, nature of suit, and counsel where available.

What is the best free alternative to the PACER API?

CourtListener's RECAP archive is the leading free source for federal docket data, and this Actor turns it into clean CSV / JSON output. It is free to run on Apify and needs no PACER credentials.

How do I download court opinions and case law as CSV or JSON?

Set searchType=opinions and run, then export the dataset from Apify as CSV, JSON, or Excel, or fetch it via the API. Opinion records include reporter citations and precedential status.

How can I track lawsuits filed against a specific company?

Use searchType=dockets with the company name as your keyword and orderBy=dateFiled desc. Schedule it weekly with a rolling filedSince to catch each new case as it is filed.

How do I monitor new federal court filings by court or date?

Combine the court filter (e.g. cand, nysd) with filedSince / filedUntil, sorted dateFiled desc, and schedule the run so each execution returns only the latest filings in that court and window.

What court data fields can I export?

Records include case name, court and court ID, docket number, filing / argued / terminated dates, judge, cause, nature of suit, jurisdiction type, citation, status, attorneys, firm, and a source URL - see the output table above.

Is scraping public court records legal?

This Actor reads public court data from CourtListener's official API. Court records in these sources are public. As with any data use, follow CourtListener's terms and apply your own judgment for your jurisdiction and use case.

How do I search both federal dockets and case-law opinions in one tool?

That is this Actor's core advantage: flip the searchType input between dockets and opinions to search RECAP federal dockets or published case law from the same Actor - no second tool needed.

How can I set up alerts for new litigation matching a keyword?

Schedule the Actor with your keyword and a rolling filedSince, then connect an Apify integration (webhook, Slack, email, Zapier, or Make) so you are notified whenever a new matching record appears.

Data source & notes

• Source: CourtListener by the Free Law Project, via its official public API (including the RECAP federal docket archive).
• Coverage: US federal court dockets (RECAP) and published court opinions / case law. Field availability varies by mode and by what the source publishes for each record - for example, attorneys, firm, and some dates may be absent on individual cases.
• Access: Free to run; no PACER account required.
• Use responsibly: Data reflects what is publicly available on CourtListener at run time. Verify critical facts against primary court sources for legal decisions, and follow the source's terms of use.
• Actor: maydit/us-court-cases-scraper (id cjLNkDqsBxobJ02Hb).