Which Collin County Court Will Hear Your Case?

Most people who call me after an arrest have a piece of paper with a court number on it. Sometimes it says something like “416th.” Sometimes it says “CCL 4.” Sometimes it says nothing useful at all. Then they go online, find that Collin County has more than twenty courts, and get more confused than when they started.

Here is how the courts here are laid out, and how a case finds its way to one of them.

Almost all of it happens in one building

Almost all criminal cases in Collin County are heard at the Russell A. Steindam Courts Building, 2100 Bloomdale Road in McKinney. The county lists all fifteen of its district courts and all seven of its county courts at law at that address. The Criminal District Attorney’s Office sits in the same building, and so does the magistrate court that handles probable cause findings, bond setting, and warrants after an arrest.

So if your paperwork says 2100 Bloomdale, you are going to the right place regardless of which court number is on it. Parking and entry are their own small ordeal, and I walk through those details in the Collin County courthouse guide.

Felonies go to a district court

Under Article 4.05 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, district courts have original jurisdiction over felony cases. They also handle misdemeanors involving official misconduct and misdemeanors transferred to them under Article 4.17.

Collin County has fifteen district courts: the 199th, 219th, 296th, 366th, 380th, 401st, 416th, 417th, 429th, 468th, 469th, 470th, 471st, 493rd, and 494th. Not all of them are criminal courts. Several carry mostly civil or family dockets. The county identifies the 417th as the court with juvenile programs, the 219th as the adult mental health court, and the 296th as the veterans court program.

On the prosecution side, the district attorney’s office describes its Felony Trial Division as seven trial teams, and its felony pages list the 199th, 219th, 296th, 366th, 380th, 401st, and 416th. Court assignments do shift over time, so treat that as the current shape of things rather than a permanent map. Confirm your own court against the county’s case lookup or with your lawyer.

Class A and Class B misdemeanors go to a county court at law

Collin County has seven statutory county courts at law, numbered 1 through 7, created under Chapter 25 of the Texas Government Code. The county clerk’s office states that it files all Class A and Class B misdemeanor cases and all Class C appeals into those courts.

The dividing line comes from two places. Government Code Section 26.045 gives county courts exclusive original jurisdiction over misdemeanors, with an exception for official misconduct and for cases where the highest possible fine is $500 or less. Article 4.07 of the Code of Criminal Procedure says the same thing from the other direction: county courts get the misdemeanors that justice courts do not have exclusive original jurisdiction over, where the fine can exceed $500.

That $500 figure is doing the real work. It is the line between a fine-only offense and one that carries possible jail time.

Two of these courts run problem-solving dockets. The county lists a veterans treatment court in County Court at Law 6 and a DWI and drug court in County Court at Law 7.

Fine-only cases go to a justice court or a city municipal court

Article 4.11 of the Code of Criminal Procedure gives justices of the peace original jurisdiction over criminal cases punishable by fine only. Collin County has four justice of the peace precincts, seated in McKinney, Lavon, Plano, and Frisco.

Article 4.14 handles the city courts. Municipal courts have exclusive original jurisdiction over violations of their own city ordinances, and they share jurisdiction with the justice courts over fine-only state-law offenses that arise inside the city limits. McKinney, Plano, Frisco, and Allen each run one. McKinney’s sits at 130 South Chestnut Street, away from the county complex.

One thing people get wrong here. A Class C misdemeanor carries a fine of up to $500 under Penal Code Section 12.23 and no jail. People hear “no jail” and assume it does not count. It does. A Class C conviction is a criminal conviction, and it can show up on a background check years later when someone is applying for a job or a license.

My work is in the county courts at law and the district courts, on the Class A, Class B, and felony side. I do not handle tickets or moving violations.

How your case gets to a court

The arrest is the beginning, not the filing. The arresting agency, which might be McKinney PD, Frisco PD, Plano PD, a sheriff’s deputy, or DPS, sends the case to the Collin County Criminal District Attorney’s Office. That office decides what gets filed and at what level.

For a Class A or Class B misdemeanor, the charging instrument is an information. Article 21.20 defines it as a written statement filed on behalf of the State by the district or county attorney. Article 21.22 adds that no information can be presented until a credible person has sworn out an affidavit charging the offense, and that affidavit is filed with the information. Once the information is filed, the case lands in one of the seven county courts at law.

For a felony, the case goes to a grand jury. If the grand jury returns an indictment, the indicted case is docketed in one of the district courts.

Why the court number on your bond paperwork can change

The number you got at the jail often reflects the magistrate’s initial paperwork, not the court that will eventually try the case. The prosecutor may file the case at a different level than the arrest charge. A charge booked as a felony can come back filed as a misdemeanor, and that alone moves the case from the district courts to the courts at law. Assume the early number is provisional until the charging instrument is filed.

What a transfer means

Cases move between courts for ordinary reasons. Dockets get rebalanced. A defendant with more than one open case may have them consolidated in front of one judge. A case may move into a specialty docket. A transfer is a scheduling and administrative event. It is not a signal about how your case is going.

Looking up your own court and setting

Collin County publishes its case information online. The county’s case lookup page offers an online judicial search by name, case number, or citation number, a case search covering district courts, county courts at law, probate, and justice courts, a case record inquiry, and a court calendar search you can use to pull dockets. The county notes that the case search data is updated daily at 6 p.m. while the case record inquiry updates in real time, so if two screens disagree, the case record inquiry is the fresher one.

Search by your name and date of birth. What you want off that screen is the court, the cause number, and the next setting date and time.

If you are trying to figure out where you stand, you are welcome to call the office and set up a free consultation. Our front desk answers the phone and will get you on my calendar. I do the consultation myself, and I will tell you plainly what court your case is in, what the charge level means, and what the next few months look like.

This article is general information about Texas law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every case turns on its own facts.