Connecticut public records · Courts & processing
Courts & case processing
How long cases take to resolve: arrest- and offense-to-sentence time, by court, case type and charge class, plus the backlog and continuance measures that flag courts under pressure.
Time from arrest to sentence
The clearest read on court-crowding pressure: how long cases wait to resolve.
Arrest → sentence · trailing 12 months
Each segment's width is its real share of the case load.
- Median lag
- 269 days
- Mean lag
- 404 days
- Resolved ≤ 30 / 90 / 180 days
- 1,055 / 4,262 / 9,283
Time from offense to sentence
Where an offense date is recorded, the lag from the earliest offense date on the docket to sentence separates police/filing time from court time.
- Median offense → sentence
- 310 days
- Mean offense → sentence
- 472 days
Offense dates are recorded on a subset of charges; treated as an indicative measure of the portion of total lag attributable to the courts.
Resolution time by court
Median and mean arrest-to-sentence lag for each court over the trailing 12 months. Wide spread indicates uneven backlog.
| Court | Cases | Median lag (days) | Mean lag (days) |
|---|---|---|---|
| New Haven GA 23 | 2,553 | 170 | 285 |
| Hartford GA 14 | 2,346 | 299 | 439 |
| Bridgeport GA 2 | 2,344 | 320 | 453 |
| Stamford GA 1 | 2,324 | 511 | 703 |
| New Britain GA 15 | 2,273 | 291 | 394 |
| Waterbury GA 4 | 2,179 | 180 | 274 |
| Meriden GA 7 | 1,532 | 164 | 230 |
| Manchester GA 12 | 1,360 | 248 | 315 |
| New London GA 10 | 1,225 | 277 | 432 |
| Norwich GA 21 | 1,089 | 260 | 378 |
| Middletown GA 9 | 1,062 | 218 | 331 |
| Torrington GA 18 | 915 | 226 | 334 |
| Danielson GA 11 and JD | 903 | 317 | 454 |
| Danbury GA 3 and JD | 874 | 294 | 363 |
| Derby GA 5 | 856 | 289 | 380 |
| Milford GA 22 | 740 | 198 | 292 |
| Rockville GA 19 | 631 | 240 | 395 |
| New Haven JD | 382 | 566 | 664 |
| Hartford Comm Court | 255 | 109 | 184 |
| Hartford JD | 191 | 699 | 838 |
| Bridgeport JD | 128 | 381 | 623 |
| Waterbury JD | 123 | 574 | 650 |
| New Britain JD | 120 | 491 | 606 |
| Stamford JD | 106 | 796 | 924 |
| Milford JD | 82 | 704 | 884 |
| New London JDt | 75 | 516 | 604 |
| Tolland JD | 63 | 510 | 669 |
| Litchfield JD | 59 | 578 | 599 |
| Middlesex JD | 38 | 613 | 778 |
| Waterbury Comm Court | 13 | 26 | 101 |
By case type & charge class
How the mix of criminal versus motor-vehicle dockets and the severity of charges shape resolution time.
Median arrest → sentence by case type
Criminal (CR) and motor vehicle (MV) dockets.
Median offense → sentence by charge class
Backlog & continuance
Long-lag cases that still end in confinement are the population-forecast risk: they consume court time and, on sentence, feed the census.
- Cases open > 365 days (arrest → sentence)
- 10,011
- …that resolved to a confinement term
- 4,337
- Share sentenced ≥ 90 days after arrest
- 84.3%
- Share sentenced ≥ 180 days after arrest
- 65.7%
Arrest date is used as the proxy for the start of the case (a filing/arraignment timestamp is not published). Offense-date based lags, where available, isolate the court-phase portion.