VIC - Criminal General

This article will show you how to:

• Create a Criminal matter
• Enter Court Details
• Enter Charge Details
• Add Uncommon Contacts 
• Enter the Court contact card
• Enter Informant and Informant Agency
• Change existing General matter to Criminal General
• Subscribe to the Criminal Precedent Profile

 To create a new Criminal General matter, follow the steps below. 

1. Click New Matter from the Home Screen.
2. Select State: VIC.
3. Select Matter Type: Criminal General.
4. Select which party you are acting for (Accused or Prosecution): 
   
5. Enter the party details - see Adding Contacts for more information on adding contacts. 
6. Select 'Court Details' to enter the Case Number, Registry, Division, List and Court:
   
   - See Entering the Court contact card (below) for further details on how to enter Courts.
7. Select 'Charge Details' to enter your charge filing details and all charge(s) brought by a particular Informant. Select 'Add Charge' if you need to add additional rows of charges:
   
   - See Entering the Informant contact card (below) for further details on how to enter your Informant and Informant Agency.
8. If your Charge Sheet has charges brought by multiple Informants, you can 'right-click' > Add Charge Details to add Charge Details for your second and subsequent Informants:
   
9. To add Uncommon Contacts to your matter, open the Matter Settings and select the appropriate contact from the Parties & Data available in your matter.
   For Criminal General (VIC), the available parties include Barrister, Legal Aid, Corrections, Parole Board, Legal Agent, Expert, Witness, Process Server, Previous Solicitor and Additional Contacts:
   

Entering the Court contact card

1. Create an Organisation contact card for your particular Court Registry.
2. Enter the registry Street Address, PO Box Address and other contact details. 
3. Next select Advanced view.
   
4. Enter the Registry name in the 'Branch' field:
   
5. The Court Details layout will then display as follows. 
   
6. By adding the Registry in the Branch field, you will be able to differentiate between your Court registries and avoid creating duplicate contacts:
   

Entering Informant and Informant Agency

1. Open Charge Details layout to enter Informant Agency and Informant.
2. Enter the Informant Agency organisation contact card - e.g. "Victoria Police - Hastings".
3. Enter the contact details of the Informant Agency organisation.
4. Enter the Informant as a contact on this organisation.
5. Enter the Informant's information, including contact number and email.
6. Enter the Informant's Role within the "Business Role" field on the contact card.
   
7. The Informant's ID number can then be added in the Charge Details layout:
   

Change existing General matter to Criminal General

Existing VIC General matters can be easily changed to Criminal General as follows:

1. Open your existing General matter (used for criminal matters)
2. Open Matter Type
3. Select change...
4. Select new Matter Type as Criminal > Criminal General
5. Select OK:
   
6. Select which Party you are acting for (Accused or Prosecution)
7. Enter Reason For Change
8. Select OK:
   

Your matter will now appear as 'Criminal General', with the party roles and layouts that are available in the Criminal General matter:

Don't forget to! ...

Subscribe to the Criminal Precedent Profile

You can subscribe to the Criminal Precedent Profile in your Smokeball Settings: 

- See Precedent Profiles for more information on subscribing to precedent profiles.

We have some Criminal precedents and forms available in the Smokeball Precedent Library, including automated Magistrates' Court and County Court Criminal Forms:

You can also 'Request a form' to have additional forms added to the Precedent Library!