Court costs

Court costs (also called law costs in English procedure) are the costs of handling a case, which, depending on legal rules, may or may not include the costs of the various parties in a lawsuit in addition to the costs of the court itself. In the United States, "court costs" (such as filing fees, copying and postage) are differentiated from attorney's fees, which are the hourly rates paid to attorneys for their work in a case. Court costs can reach very high amounts, often far beyond the actual monetary worth of a case. Cases are known in which one party won the case, but lost more than the monetary worth in court costs. Court costs may be awarded to one or both parties in a lawsuit, or they may be waived.^[1]

In the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada, the losing side is usually ordered to pay the winning side's costs. This acts as a significant disincentive to bringing forward court cases. Usually, the winning party is not able to recover from the losing party the full amount of their own solicitor's (attorney's) costs, and has to pay the shortfall out of pocket. The loser pays principle does not generally apply under the United States legal system.

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{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\cocoartf1138\cocoasubrtf320 {\fonttbl\f0\fswiss\fcharset0 ArialMT;} {\colortbl;\red255\green255\blue255;\red51\green51\blue51;} \margl1440\margr1440\vieww10800\viewh8400\viewkind0 \deftab720 \pard\pardeftab720\ri720\sl273\qc \f0\b\fs28 \cf2 \ul \ulc2 4 Factors That Can Affect Your Traffic Court Costs\ \pard\pardeftab720\ri720\sl360\slmult1\sa200\qj \b0\fs24 \cf0 \ulnone \uc0\u8232 Hi Guys! Barry Kowitt here - One of the lawyers at the law firm of Unger and Kowitt and today I want to talk to you about the 4 factors that can influence your court costs.\ We have been doing this now for 17 years and have helped hundreds of thousands of clients. The reality is, as much as we know, everybody wants to get their case dismissed, they can\'92t all get dismissed. And anyone who tells you that they get every case dismissed, I would be very leery of that, and certainly you would like to get that in writing. But for the ones that don\'92t get dismissed, you might end up having to pay some court costs.\ Now in almost every case, the court costs are much less than you would have to pay, if you just want ahead and paid the ticket and received points, which lead to insurance increases. \ When it comes to court costs, there basically are 4 factors that can influence your court costs versus somebody else\'92s.\ 1. \b \ul Type of Ticket You Received\ulnone . \b0 The first one is the \b type of ticket you received \b0 . We can all agree that some violations are certainly worse than others. I mean, driving 90 in a school zone is a worse violation than perhaps making a u-turn at 2 in the morning, when nobody is on the road. So, that\'92s the first factor.\ 2. \b \ul Your Past Driving History \b0 \ulnone . The second factor is \b your past driving history \b0 . If you have an excellent driving record and this is your first ticket in the past 4, 5 or 10 years, you are going to get a much better result than somebody who basically is coming to court every 6 months. The judges will see that and they will make that determination. \ 3. \b \ul Your Attitude Towards the Police Officer \b0 \ulnone . The next factor is \b your attitude towards the police officer \b0 . As much as you are feeling angry or you are feeling frustration, you can\'92t look that officer in the eye and start calling them all these names, and not think it is going to come back to haunt you. The officers will write down in their ticket book all the things that you said \'96 All the pleasantries if you will, that you said and when the time comes to go to court, they are going to tell the judge all those things and they will hold it against you. So you might want to remember that next time you get pulled over, just bite your tongue, roll up the window, drive away, call him whatever you want at that point, out of ear-shot obviously, but it is not in your best interest to do that.\ 4. \b \ul A Particular Judge or Magistrate \b0 \ulnone . The last factor is a particular \b judge or magistrate \b0 that is going to hear your case. The reality is, they are all different. They have good days, they have bad days and they decide your court costs based on whatever they are feeling that day. Although there might be a range that most of them work with, obviously you want to be on the lower end of that range. Some of them just consistently wind up in the lower range and some of them consistently go to the higher end.\ Well! I hope that helps you understand, perhaps why court costs are or what they are and why they are a little bit different from the last time you may have got the ticket and why your neighbor up the street told you he had the same violation but his court costs are a lot lower or perhaps a lot higher. This is the reason. \ If you have any other questions, you can certainly give us a call. You can email us or you can just drop us a line or go to our website. \ Thanks a lot!\ }

United States

The loser pays principle does not apply under the United States legal system unless there is a specific statute awarding fees to the prevailing party.^[2] Alternatively, the contract between the parties may provide that the prevailing party is entitled to recover attorney's fees from the losing party. In cases in the federal court system, Title 28, section 1920, of the United States Code provides:^[3]^[4]

A judge or clerk of any court of the United States may tax as costs the following:
(1) Fees of the clerk and marshal; (2) Fees for printed or electronically recorded transcripts necessarily obtained for use in the case; (3) Fees and disbursements for printing and witnesses; (4) Fees for exemplification and the costs of making copies of any materials where the copies are necessarily obtained for use in the case; (5) Docket fees under section 1923 of this title; (6) Compensation of court appointed experts, compensation of interpreters, and salaries, fees, expenses, and costs of special interpretation services under section 1828 of this title.
A bill of costs shall be filed in the case and, upon allowance, included in the judgment or decree.

A 2022 study, which used a randomized controlled trial of court-related fee relief for misdemeanor defendants in an Oklahoma county, found that court fees neither caused nor deterred new crime, and did not provide meaningful financial benefit to the government.^[5]

Court costs by U.S. jurisdiction

Jurisdiction	Criminal Cases	Notes
U.S. Federal	Defendant never liable for court fees^[6]	Government liable for defendant attorney's fees in cases of bad faith prosecution^[6]
Alabama	Court fees payable on request of the judge if convicted^[7]
Alaska	Court fees payable on conviction unless good cause shown^[8]
Arizona	Court fees never available in a criminal case, even in cases of a bad faith argument^[9]
Arkansas	Court costs assessed on conviction or guilty plea;^[10] $150 for misdemeanor or felony violation and $75 for local ordinance^[10]
California
Colorado	Court costs range from $5.00 for the most minor crimes to $4,500 for felony drug convictions and up to $3,000 for sex crimes^[11]
Connecticut	$20 fee for those convicted of felony, $15 for misdemeanor^[12]
Delaware	$10 fee for those convicted of any charge^[13]
Florida	$200 fee for those convicted of felony, $50 for misdemeanor, with many additional costs depending on the crime^[14]	Florida is known to use a large number of fees, these can be collected from defendants with a 40% surcharge^[15]
Georgia	Georgia assesses a 10% additional fee if a defendant challenges a traffic violation and is found guilty^[16]	Georgia has been criticized^[by whom?] for its high level of fees
Hawaii
Idaho	Defendants are often required to pay fees^[17]
Illinois	Offenders can be ordered to pay some court costs^[18]	Paying court fees can be a condition for parole
Jurisdiction	Criminal Cases	Notes