The improvements in accessibility that courts throughout the country made when they adopted virtual hearings and electronic filing in March 2020 were "unprecedented" and "impressive," but they disproportionately benefited litigants with legal representation, according to the report from the Pew Charitable Trusts.
Litigants without attorneys may have actually found it more difficult to access the courts as a result of the changes, the report said.
For some, "the move toward modernization failed to improve their interactions with the civil legal system and may even have made them more difficult," Pew's researchers said in the report, titled "How Courts Embraced Technology, Met the Pandemic Challenge and Revolutionized Their Operations."
The study looked at how courts in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., used technology to adapt to the pandemic between March and August 2020, Pew's Qudsiya Naqui said in a Wednesday briefing about the report.
Researchers found that state civil courts' use of technology "exploded" during that time, according to Naqui, who added that "as the pandemic shut our courthouses, technology really kept the wheels of justice turning for civil courts."
Texas courts, for example, conducted 1.1 million remote criminal and civil proceedings between March 2020 and February 2021 despite never having held a civil hearing via video before, according to the report.
In addition to keeping courts running, that rapid adoption of technology improved the rate of participation in the civil legal system, with Arizona's civil courts experiencing an 8% drop in default judgments between 2019 and 2020, Naqui said.
But those benefits were disproportionately reaped by litigants with legal representation, according to the research.
"Technology has continued to disproportionately benefit parties with counsel and high-volume users of the court system, such as certain debt collectors, creating challenges to court officials' goal of ensuring equitable processes," the researchers wrote.
That's in part because the new technology was adopted so hastily that instructions often omitted key details and created confusion for court users, layering more complications on top of an already complicated system, according to the study.
A lack of access to technology and some litigants' disabilities or lack of proficiency in English also meant that new tools could create obstacles rather than overcome them for unrepresented litigants, according to the report.
Electronic filing made it far easier for debt collectors to file lawsuits "en masse, in bulk," for instance, but in eight states, people without lawyers could not file documents electronically in debt collection disputes, according to Naqui.
Researchers found a similar inequity when it came to evictions. The vast majority of states encouraged or required courts to use virtual hearings in eviction cases, but in nine states, unrepresented litigants couldn't file paperwork electronically in eviction cases.
"So that means that in some instances, it's likely that individuals were required to participate virtually in eviction hearings, but they couldn't file the paperwork necessary to prove their case," Naqui pointed out.
Researchers spoke to one litigant who appeared in a virtual eviction hearing and was not able to submit evidence because the "share" button on the individual's Zoom platform was disabled, according to Naqui. That person was ultimately evicted and no longer has stable housing.
"Either connectivity or ability to access elements of a technology can have substantial consequences for people," Naqui said.
The situation can be improved, however, according to the report.
Researchers listed three steps courts could take to make sure new technology is providing equitable access for those without representation.
First, courts should simplify forms and procedures. As an example, the report's authors pointed to how several court systems eliminated or revised in-person notary requirements during the pandemic.
"Courts should avoid layering technology on top of already difficult-to-use systems," Naqui said.
Courts should also have potential users test new technologies before implementing them and apply the users' feedback to refine the tools.
Finally, courts can make better use of data. Utah courts, for instance, included accessibility testing for disabled users when rolling out a new online dispute resolution system, according to Naqui. And Texas, Michigan and Florida have all engaged third-party researchers to evaluate their dispute resolution platforms.
"Data can be really helpful, both for deep analysis by researchers and to help the public really understand and look under the hood of courts systems across the country," she said.
So while the new technology most state courts implemented at the start of the pandemic is "an important first step," according to the researchers, courts now have to work to ensure that technology equally impacts represented and unrepresented litigants.
"Now that courts have taken the step of adopting technology, they have an opportunity to use it to address long-standing inequities," the report said.
--Editing by Jill Coffey.
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