Search Hamilton County Criminal Court Clerk Records

How Hamilton County Splits Clerk Duties

Hamilton County does not use one clerk for every court. Duties are split across several offices, and that split matters when you hunt for a record. A person looking for "court records" may need a different office depending on the case type. Send a criminal request to the wrong clerk and you wait while it gets bounced.

Three offices sit at the center of this page. The Criminal Court Clerk holds criminal and Sessions criminal files. The Clerk and Master handles Chancery Court paperwork, including estates, trusts, and guardianships. The County Clerk issues marriage licenses and keeps the marriage record. A fourth office, the Circuit Court Clerk, holds civil and General Sessions civil files and is covered on its own page.

The table below sorts the offices by the records each one holds and the line to call. For the civil side, see the Hamilton County Circuit Court Clerk page.

Pick the office that matches your case type, then use its portal or call its line.

Criminal Court Clerk Vince Dean

Vince Dean serves as the Hamilton County Criminal Court Clerk. The office keeps the file for felony and misdemeanor cases after a grand jury indictment, a presentment, an information, or an appeal from a lower court. It also keeps Sessions criminal files, which cover misdemeanor judgments and traffic offenses. The office works out of the Courts Building on Market Street in downtown Chattanooga.

For public lookups, the county runs the Court Case Display portal. The site is current and updated daily, yet the county is clear that it is not official information and does not speak for the clerk, the district attorney, the Criminal Courts, or the General Sessions Courts. Names can be confused or misused, and many people who are not involved share the same name, so the public display alone cannot confirm anything for certain. You can search by defendant name, case number, driver's license, social security number, or SPN. The portal lives at cjuscaseinfo.hamiltontn.gov.

To send a question or ask about a record, the office uses an online contact form. The form routes your message straight to Clerk Vince Dean.

You can reach the office through the Criminal Court Clerk contact form, which sends your name, email, phone, and comments to the clerk.

Fill in your comments, name, email, and daytime phone, then submit the form to start a reply from the office.

Clerk and Master for Chancery Court

The Clerk and Master is the clerk for Chancery Court, which is the county's equity court. This office handles the paperwork and fees tied to Chancery matters and is sometimes called upon to act as a Chancellor to the court. The records here cover a broad slice of civil and estate work that does not fit the criminal side.

Chancery Court hears domestic relations, workers' compensation, estates, trusts, contracts, administrative review, delinquent taxes, guardianships, conservatorships, partnership and corporate dissolutions, liens, boundary lines, breach of contract, fraud, and election contests. Estate, trust, and guardianship files are the records most people come looking for here. For a deeper look at estate files, see probate records.

Costs on the Chancery side shift, and the listed amounts are estimates rather than real-time figures. The office asks callers to phone 423-209-6600 for up-to-date court cost. To make a formal public records request, the office uses an Open Records Request form built around the Tennessee Public Records Act.

• Estate administration files, including inventories, accountings, and orders
• Trust petitions and trust administration records
• Guardianship and conservatorship files
• Will contest filings and potential-heir resources
• Equity matters such as liens, boundary lines, and election contests

The office publishes its request form online at the Clerk and Master Open Records Request form, which says a request must be detailed enough for staff to identify the responsive records.

County Clerk Bill Knowles

Bill Knowles serves as the Hamilton County County Clerk. For court-record purposes, the key role of this office is marriage. A Tennessee county clerk must issue a marriage license before a marriage can take place, and in Hamilton County that is this office. The County Clerk both issues the license and keeps the marriage record.

The county runs an online marriage portal. You can apply for a marriage license or certificate request ahead of time, search licenses by name, date, or officiant, and print reports by issue date. The portal carries a precise cutoff: marriage records exist on the site from 1857 through August 3, 2021. For licenses issued after that date, the portal tells you to call the County Clerk's office at 423-209-6500.

The marriage information page explains the basic rule that a county clerk license comes first, before any ceremony.

The county posts marriage details on the Hamilton County Clerk marriage page, which states a Tennessee county clerk must issue the license before a marriage can occur.

From there you can move into the application flow or run a license search by name, date, or officiant. The live search and certificate request tool sits at marriagelicense.hamiltontn.gov. For divorce decrees and certified marriage copies, the marriage and divorce records page lays out the full path.

How to Request a Certified Copy

A certified copy is the official version of a record. It carries the clerk's stamp and is the version a court or agency will accept. An online printout is only for reference. The office you ask depends on the record. Criminal files go to the Criminal Court Clerk, Chancery and estate files go to the Clerk and Master, and marriage records go to the County Clerk.

The steps below work for any of the three offices. Confirm the fee by phone first, since none of these offices publishes a fixed copy fee on the pages reviewed.

1. Decide which clerk holds the record: criminal, Chancery, or marriage.
2. Find the case or record using that office's portal, or gather the full names and the year.
3. Call the office to confirm the record exists and to ask the current fee.
4. Submit your request through the office's form, in person, or by the method it accepts.
5. Pay the quoted fee, then pick up or wait for the certified copy by mail.

Keep the certified copy safe. A replacement means paying again.

Clerk Fees and What to Expect

None of these three offices posts a fixed fee table on the official pages reviewed for this site. That is why the safest step is to call the office before you submit anything. The Criminal Court Clerk states plainly that it charges a fee for record searches and for certified criminal documentation. The Clerk and Master directs callers to phone for current court cost. The County Clerk handles marriage fees through its office line.

A few terms come up again and again when you call. The short glossary below defines the ones that trip people up most.

Certified copy

An official copy stamped by the clerk that proves it matches the file the office holds.

Disposition

The outcome of a charge or case, such as a guilty plea or a dismissal.

Clerk and Master

The Tennessee Chancery Court clerk who manages filings, fees, and equity records.

SPN

A booking identifier used in some county searches to pull a specific person's records.

Public Access and Limits

Tennessee law makes most of these records open to the public. The Tennessee Public Records Act gives citizens the right to inspect county records during business hours, and Tennessee Supreme Court Rule 34 applies that right to court records. Each county office carries out the law through its own public records policy and request form, which is why the Clerk and Master and the County Clerk both publish forms.

Open does not mean everything. Juvenile files stay confidential under state law. Sealed records and protective-order material stay closed without a court order. After an expungement, the clerk must remove eligible public records from electronic databases. Personal identifiers like social security and account numbers are redacted on public displays.

The county clerk's public records policy spells out how that office answers a request, and the Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts hosts the rule that governs access to court files at Rule 34. The County Clerk's own policy is posted at countyclerkanytime.com.

Criminal Court Clerk Contact

The Criminal Court Clerk is the office to call for verification of criminal court information and for certified criminal documentation. It sits in the Courts Building on Market Street. The contact card below holds the address and phone the county publishes for the office.

For criminal case lookups and recent arrest history, see arrest records. The full record-system overview lives on the court records page.