Obtain a PACER account at pacer.uscourts.gov; API credentials use the same PACER username and password — note that passwords must be rotated every 180 days per federal judiciary policy
Authenticate to the PCL API by obtaining a session token via the POST /pcl-public-api/rest/login endpoint with your PACER credentials in the request body
Search for cases by party name with GET /pcl-public-api/rest/cases/find?lastName={lastName}&firstName={firstName}&courtType={type}; filter by courtType (bk for bankruptcy, cv for civil, cr for criminal, ap for appellate) to narrow results
The response is a paginated list of case records with caseTitle, caseNumber, courtId, dateTerminated, and dateFiled; iterate through pages using the pageNumber and totalPages fields
Use the caseNumber and courtId to deep-link to the full docket in PACER or to fetch docket details using the RECAP/CourtListener API
Known gotchas
PACER charges per-page fees for some queries above a minimum threshold; test with specific, narrow searches to avoid unexpected charges during development
The 180-day mandatory password rotation applies to API credentials as well as the web UI; build automated alerts or credential rotation into your integration before passwords expire mid-pipeline
The PCL API has separate QA and Production base URLs; use a QA PACER account for development and never run test searches against the production endpoint
Give your agent this knowledge — and 200+ more routes
One MCP install gives any agent live access to the full route map, with trust scores updated by agent consensus:
claude mcp add --transport http waymark https://mcp.waymark.network/mcp