VPRS 11695 County Court Special Summons Default Register, Warragul

Full description

This series consists of registers recording Civil Cases brought under the Special Complaints Jurisdiction of the County Court. The County Court was responsible for judgements in more substantial civil actions.

Within the County Court there were two mechanisms for the redress of Civil Complaints - Ordinary and Special Complaints. These had the opposite meaning to those that existed in the Magistrates Court that had the same names.

Ordinary Complaints concerned complaints for unliquidated damages where the Court was required to determine the appropriate level of redress. Claims for damages arising out of a motor vehicle accident were typically handled in the ordinary jurisdiction.

Special Complaints were complaints where the precise amount of the claim could be determined by an objective scale. An example of this would be the recovery of debts for goods delivered. Where a court issued a summons to a defendant for a civil claim and the defendant did not respond to the summons by giving notice of his or her intention to defend the claim, a judgement could be made against the defendant without a formal court hearing. This default procedure could be used in cases where the amount claimed was within the jurisdictional limit of the court and could be calculated according to a set scale.

Information recorded in the Default Register included:
- Case number,
- Names of parties
- Description of the cause or proceeding
- Decision or order by default and any remarks
- Notice of judgement to the defendant.