Marshall County Criminal Docket Searches
Start with the court level. Public Circuit Court criminal cases are available through WVPASS, which covers statewide Circuit records from July 1, 1999 forward. Public Magistrate criminal cases use the free Magistrate Case Record Search. A city ordinance case may remain with its municipal clerk and may appear in neither system. Searching the wrong system is the most common reason a valid Marshall County case seems absent.
Gather the full name, an approximate filing date, and any case number from a notice. MCRSearch accepts first name plus last name or a case number and returns no more than 30 matches. WVPASS requires a registered account for free case browsing. Its public document images cost 25 cents per page and are not certified copies.
- Identify Circuit, Magistrate, or municipal jurisdiction from the charging paper.
- Search WVPASS for Circuit Court or MCRSearch for Magistrate Court.
- Match the caption, filing date, court, and case ID before opening a result.
- Read the charge, bond, event schedule, docket entries, and disposition as separate fields.
- Call the proper clerk when a record is missing or a certified paper is required.
Marshall County MCR Case Codes
Magistrate case IDs encode the court and case type. An observed format such as 24-M25M-00000 is illustrative, not a number to reuse as a real case. Marshall examples can also carry prefixes such as MMFCF, MGNCH, MGHCT, and MMOJO. Those codes help distinguish a felony complaint, a criminal matter, or another lower-court record, but the charge block and court name control.
- MMFCF
- An observed felony-complaint code in Magistrate records.
- MGNCH
- An observed criminal-history or charge-related code whose exact meaning should be confirmed with the clerk.
- Disposition
- The court's final action on a charge, not merely a moved hearing.
- Continuance
- An order that moves a setting while the case remains open.
Do not infer guilt from a filing code. A code locates a row; later docket entries show what happened.
Marshall Criminal Dockets: What They Show
The Marshall County Magistrate case detail is arranged in panels. It may identify the agency, filing date, case status, charge and statute, bond information, attorneys, event schedule, issuing magistrate, reason closed, and a chronological docket-entry list. The result is information only. MCRSearch does not supply the underlying complaint, order, or other document image.
| Case Number | The unique Circuit or Magistrate identifier used for an exact search. |
|---|---|
| Charge | Offense text, cited statute, count, and amended charge when recorded. |
| Bond | Type, amount, payor, and release information when public. |
| Event Schedule | Date, time, room, magistrate or judge, and event type. |
| Docket Entry | Dated acts such as filings, notices, continuances, pleas, orders, and closure. |
| Disposition | The outcome and reason closed, which must be read charge by charge. |
Marshall Charge and Bond Panels
A charge row and a bond row answer different questions. The charge block identifies the alleged offense and statute. The bond panel records release terms and may name a bond payor. Neither is the final outcome. Look farther down the Marshall County criminal court docket for plea, court disposition, sentencing, or a reason-closed field.
The public framed case-detail interface shows the structure without making a private person's values part of this reference. The Judiciary's case-detail interface demonstrates why each panel should be read in context.
One continued setting does not erase the charge or close the case. It normally means the event moved. Check for the next scheduled event and the dated docket entry that authorized the change.
Criminal Case Stages on the Docket
A lower-court criminal record may begin with a complaint, warrant, initial appearance, and bond entry. An arraignment records the plea and sets the next step. Pretrial events can include discovery, motions, status conferences, continuances, and a jury request. A plea or trial does not become a disposition until the court records its ruling. Sentencing can follow on a later date.
Docket flow: Filing › Arraignment › Pretrial › Plea or Trial › Disposition › Sentencing
A felony complaint can start in Marshall County Magistrate Court before transfer or indictment creates a Circuit Court case. That creates two identifiers and two histories. Preserve both numbers and search both systems.
When a Marshall Criminal Case Is Missing
First confirm spelling and court level. MCRSearch caps a name search at 30 results, so a common name may need a case number. WVPASS omits sealed matters and juvenile cases. Municipal ordinance prosecutions are outside the unified state system and may remain with the city clerk.
If the matter should be in Circuit Court, contact Marshall County Circuit Clerk Joseph M. Rucki at Room 127, 600 Seventh Street, Moundsville, or call 304-845-2130 during published weekday hours. For Magistrate records, the Marshall County Magistrate Clerk is at 511 Sixth Street. The Judiciary lists 304-221-2701 for the clerk, while the county page lists 304-845-4811 for the office.
Ask the clerk to validate the case number, status, and custodian. Older paper records may predate online coverage. A clerk search is also the right route for a certified complaint, disposition, or sentencing order.
Marshall County Criminal Docket Courts
Marshall County Magistrate Court handles misdemeanors, warrants, bail, preliminary felony examinations, and state-law traffic matters. Its three listed magistrates are Zachary B. Allman, Kevin W. Cecil, and Thomas P. Wood. Felonies and major criminal proceedings belong in Circuit Court, where Marshall shares the Second Judicial Circuit with Tyler and Wetzel Counties.
| Court | Criminal work | Public route |
|---|---|---|
| Magistrate | Misdemeanors, warrants, bond, preliminary felony steps | MCRSearch and Magistrate Clerk |
| Circuit | Felonies, indictments, trials, lower-court appeals | WVPASS and Circuit Clerk |
| Municipal | City ordinance violations | City court or city clerk |
The county clerk is not the Circuit Clerk. Land, probate-administration, marriage, and county-commission records at Room 106 do not replace a criminal docket search.
Certified Marshall Criminal Papers
WVPASS can display publicly available Circuit documents, but its downloads are expressly not certified. The Circuit Clerk authenticates Circuit Court copies. State law lists a one-dollar-per-page charge for copies leaving that office, while the exact local certification amount and turnaround were not published in the reviewed Marshall sources.
Magistrate documents are not online through MCRSearch. Administrative rules set Magistrate copies at 25 cents per page. Give the clerk the case number, caption, exact document, entry date, and whether a plain or certified copy is needed. Call first if timing matters.
A docket entry is not the filed paper behind it. Request the complaint, order, judgment, or disposition by name instead of asking for “everything.” That keeps the request clear and helps the clerk identify any access limit.
Marshall Criminal Filing Context
The official 2024 annual report contains separate Marshall County criminal rows for Circuit and Magistrate Courts. The Circuit row reports 18 criminal filings. The Magistrate table separates felony complaints, misdemeanors, juvenile misdemeanors, worthless-check matters, and other proceedings, though the extracted table must be checked against its page image before quoting each cell.
These are filings during one year, not active pending cases. They do not show guilt, case length, or the number of hearings. Their practical value is structural: Marshall criminal work is split between lower-court complaints and Circuit proceedings, so one portal cannot supply every docket.
Access Rules for Criminal Dockets
West Virginia trial-court rules require reasonable access to court records during usual business hours, subject to statutes, rules, and court orders. That principle does not open every Marshall County criminal court docket. Juvenile records are confidential, sealed filings remain unavailable, and an expungement can remove the record from public inspection. A public event list may also omit a document that contains protected facts.
Key rules:
Trial Court Rules 10.03 and 10.04 govern inspection and copies of court records.
West Virginia Code §49-5-103 protects juvenile records.
West Virginia Code §61-11-26 states the sealing effect of a criminal expungement.
The West Virginia Freedom of Information Act supports access to public records, but court-specific rules and confidentiality laws still control judicial files. When a search result is absent, ask the clerk whether it is outside portal coverage rather than assuming it is sealed.