How to docket and present a complaint

Before you start

Vitreo is a public docket, not a court. Publishing a complaint here does not start a disciplinary proceeding, and Vitreo makes no finding on any allegation. What it does is put a sworn, documented account on a permanent public record, give the person named a free and permanent right to answer on the same page, and let readers check the exhibits for themselves.

Vitreo is not a law firm and nothing here is legal advice. The builder and this guide help you state your own account and organise your own documents; Vitreo does not draft complaints and the only help it gives is technical, such as linking and formatting documents. Publishing a complaint has legal consequences for you as well as the person named. Review the finished complaint and its exhibits with your own counsel and decide with them whether to publish it.

Three things to settle before you begin:

• Read the complaint content policy. It governs what can be published: conduct in a professional or official capacity, supported by documents, written without personal identifiers that are not essential (account numbers, medical details, children's names, home addresses). You may refer to other cases in which the lawyer or judge has been a party, including criminal, civil, and disciplinary cases, where their public record bears on the conduct you complain of or on the person's fitness for the role.
• Gather the documents first. Court filings, orders, transcripts, letters, emails, invoices, recordings. Every allegation you make must cite at least one exhibit, so the complaint is only as strong as the paper behind it.
• Decide whether you will verify. A complaint sworn under penalty of perjury is marked ✓ Verified and publishes the moment you file it. An Unverified complaint is published only after editorial review and carries that label. Verification is explained in step 6.

You need a registered account with a confirmed email address. Register if you have not, then open File a complaint.

How the docket works

A complaint moves through fixed stages, each recorded as an entry on its docket, in the same way a civil case moves through a court's electronic docket:

Two rules follow from this. Nothing on a published docket is silently edited: a correction is a new entry, and the original stays. And every document on the docket carries a checksum, so anyone can confirm that what they download is what you filed.

Step 1: the Docketing Statement

The Docketing Statement is the short form that opens a case. It does for Vitreo what a civil cover sheet and summons do for a court: it identifies the parties, states the nature of the dispute in a paragraph, and tells the administrator enough to decide whether the matter belongs on the docket. It is reviewed before anything is published, and it is the only part of the process where an administrator exercises judgment about your case.

What it asks for

• You. Full legal name, filing capacity (for yourself, as counsel, as guardian), mailing address, email, and telephone. Your address and contact details are kept internal; they are never published. Your name appears on the public complaint.
• The person complained of. Full name; category (attorney, judge or judicial official, government official, government employee, or other); the state, territory, or federal jurisdiction; bar or juris number if you know it; position or title; court, firm, agency, or office; and an address or email where notice can be sent. If the person is already on the docket, pick the existing profile in step 2 and these fields fill in.
• Your relationship to them. Former client, opposing party, litigant before the court, constituent, employee. Ten words is enough.
• When, and in what matter. The dates or period of the conduct and, if it occurred in a court case or agency matter, its caption and docket number.
• Summary of the conduct. At least 150 characters: what the person did or failed to do, and when. Plain, chronological, specific. This is a summary; the full account comes in step 3.
• Summary of the injury. At least 60 characters: what the conduct cost you, in money, in rights, in time, in a case lost or a hearing missed.
• Where else you have complained, and the outcome. Every body you have already complained to about this conduct (grievance committee, judicial review council, inspector general, court) with the date, any reference number, and the outcome: dismissed without investigation, pending, private admonition, no response. If you have complained nowhere, say so. This is the record that makes the docket's point: what the official system did with the same facts.
• What you are seeking by publishing (optional).

Save as you go. The form keeps a running score of the eight required points and tells you what is missing before you submit.

Approval and the docket number

An administrator reads the statement and does one of three things: approves it, returns it with notes (something missing, a person misidentified, conduct outside the policy), or declines it. You are notified by email either way.

On approval the case receives its docket number, and the respondent's profile is created or linked. The number is permanent and is how the case is cited:

From here on, the respondent step is locked (the administrator has fixed who the complaint is about) and the builder moves to the complaint itself.

Step 2: the respondent

Search the directory before adding anyone. Complaints about the same person share one profile, so a reader who looks up an attorney sees every docketed matter in one place. If the person is not listed, add them with what you know; the administrator completes the record at approval. The profile page shows the person's admissions, public discipline, and any other docket cases, which is also where readers will arrive from.

Step 3: the statement of facts

This is the narrative, and it is where most complaints are won or lost as a piece of writing. The builder requires at least 300 characters; a good statement is usually 600 to 2,000 words. Some rules that experienced litigators follow and that serve a lay reader just as well:

• Chronological order. Start at the beginning of the relationship or the matter and move forward. Date every event. Readers lose the thread the moment you jump around.
• Who, what, when, where. Name the people, the court, the document, the day. "He ignored my calls" is weaker than "Between 3 and 17 December 2024 I telephoned the office six times and left messages (Exhibit D, my call log); none was returned."
• Only what you know or can document. Write what you saw, received, were told, or hold in a document. Do not characterize motives ("he wanted to protect his friend"). Where you must infer, say so: "I believe, because X and Y, that…".
• Cite the exhibit as you go. Each time a document matters, name it in parentheses: (Exhibit B). You will upload or link them in step 5 and letter them in the order filed, so plan the order now: usually the order in which the documents first appear in the narrative. It is always helpful to link the exhibits you refer to: on the docket page every "Exhibit B" in your text becomes a link to that exhibit, and any web address you paste becomes a link.
• Quote briefly; attach fully. A sentence or two quoted from an order or an email, with the full document as the exhibit. Never retype a long document into the narrative.
• Leave out what is not essential. Medical details, children's names, financial account numbers, home addresses, and the private affairs of third parties. The builder flags likely personal identifiers as you type; treat each flag as a question to answer before you file.
• Neutral, plain language. No adjectives you cannot prove. "Corrupt", "fraudulent", "incompetent" tell the reader what to think; the dates and documents let them decide. A calm narrative is also the safer one to publish.

Give the complaint a short, neutral title (eight characters or more), for example "Failure to appear at pretrial and billing for the missed hearing", and a one-paragraph summary for the docket index.

Step 4: numbered allegations

Break the narrative into discrete, numbered allegations. The rule is one act or omission per allegation, with a date, in a sentence or two, each supported by at least one exhibit. This is the form a grievance committee or a court would use, and it is what makes the complaint answerable: the respondent can admit, deny, or explain each paragraph, and the reader can see exactly what is disputed.

Allegations without a date are accepted but flagged as weaker. An allegation without an exhibit will stop the filing: the builder lists each unsupported paragraph by number until it is linked.

Step 5: docketing exhibits

See also the naming and sealing guide: how exhibits and filings are named on the docket, and how to file a document under seal.

Exhibits are the record. Everything else on the docket is argument about them. The builder handles them in a specific way, and it pays to understand it before you upload.

What you can file

• Formats: PDF, images (PNG, JPEG, GIF, WebP), plain text, Word (.doc, .docx), and common audio and video (MP3, M4A, WAV, MP4). One file per exhibit, up to 25 MB.
• Linked documents. A document already published elsewhere, such as an entry on a court's docket, a published decision, a bar or judicial-conduct ruling, or a filing in another case the person was a party to, can be docketed as a linked exhibit: paste the web address, give it a title, and say who publishes it. It is lettered like any other exhibit and the address is recorded with a checksum; readers follow the link to the publisher. If the document could be taken down or changed, upload a copy as well, since only an uploaded file is preserved on this docket.
• Prefer PDF for documents. A court filing, letter, or email thread printed to PDF is stable, searchable, and paginated, which lets you cite "Exhibit B, p. 2". Photograph or scan paper documents straight, in full, at a resolution where the text is legible.
• One document, one exhibit. Do not bundle a dozen emails into one 80-page PDF. Each thing you will cite separately should be its own exhibit, so a reader can open exactly what an allegation points to. The exception is a single record that is naturally one document, such as a transcript or a court file.
• Large files. Split a long transcript by day or by witness and title each part. Compress video; a short clip of the relevant minutes is better than an hour-long recording.

How exhibits are lettered

Your exhibits are lettered automatically in the order you upload them: A, B, C … Z, AA, AB and so on. The letter is permanent and cannot be reassigned, so upload in the order the documents appear in your narrative. (The respondent's exhibits are numbered R-1, R-2 … on the same docket, so there is never confusion about whose document is whose.)

What to fill in for each exhibit

Redaction

Before you upload, remove what is not essential: account and Social Security numbers, dates of birth, medical information, minors' names, home addresses, and the personal details of people who are not party to the complaint. Redact by blacking out in a PDF editor and re-saving as a flattened PDF (not by drawing a box that can be moved), or by cropping an image. Plain-text uploads are scanned for identifiers and flagged for you; other formats are not scanned, so the responsibility is yours. An exhibit that cannot be redacted without losing its point is a reason to summarize it in the narrative and withhold the document.

Checksums and the public record

Every exhibit receives a SHA-256 checksum when it is filed. The checksum is printed on the docket next to the exhibit, and anyone who downloads the file can recompute it and confirm the file has not been altered. This is also why exhibits cannot be replaced: a corrected or better copy is filed as a new exhibit with a new letter, and the original stays on the record.

Linking exhibits to allegations

After uploading, go back to each allegation and tick the exhibit or exhibits that support it. One exhibit may support several allegations; one allegation may rest on several exhibits. The docket page then shows each allegation with its exhibit letters, and each exhibit with the paragraphs that cite it. Nothing files until every allegation has at least one exhibit.

Exhibits you file later

After publication, new documents are added as supplements (see after filing). They take the next letter in sequence and are docketed as new entries, dated when filed, so the record shows what was available at each stage.

Step 6: verify and file

Filing has two parts: the attestation, which everyone makes, and the verification, which is optional but decisive.

The attestation

You affirm that the statements are true to the best of your knowledge and based on personal knowledge or the exhibits; that the exhibits are authentic and lawfully obtained; that you have removed non-essential personal identifiers; that you understand the complaint will be public, will name the respondent, and cannot be silently edited; that the respondent will be invited to answer at no cost; and that Vitreo is not a court and makes no finding. Read it; it is the basis on which the docket operates.

Verification

To verify, you type your full legal name as a signature under a declaration made under penalty of perjury under the laws of the United States and of the respondent's state. The declaration covers the statement of facts, each numbered allegation, and the authenticity of the exhibits. It is the same form of declaration that 28 U.S.C. § 1746 allows in place of a notarized affidavit in federal court. If you prefer, upload a signed and notarized affidavit as an exhibit in step 5 and select it here; the complaint is then marked as notarized.

A verified complaint publishes immediately on filing and carries the ✓ Verified mark on the docket, the case page, and the respondent's profile. An unverified complaint goes to editorial review, is published only if it passes, and carries the Unverified mark. Readers are told what each mark means. Any later edit to the facts or allegations clears the verification; you re-sign when you re-file.

Verify only what you can swear to. A false declaration under penalty of perjury is a crime; that is exactly why a verified complaint is worth more.

Case team

You can add registered members to help administer the complaint: a volunteer, a family member, your lawyer. Team members can edit drafts, upload exhibits, and file supplements. Only you can verify and file, and only you can change the team. Each member's actions are logged under their own name on the docket.

After filing: answers, supplements, corrections

• Notice to the respondent. When a complaint publishes, the respondent is notified at the address or email you supplied and invited to claim the profile and answer. The answer is free, permanent, and appears on the same docket page as the complaint. An answer may itself be verified under penalty of perjury and is marked the same way.
• Supplements. New developments (the grievance committee's decision, a court ruling, a new letter) are filed as supplements with their own exhibits. They are new docket entries; the original filing is unchanged.
• Corrections. If you discover an error, file a supplement that states the correction. The record shows both the original and the correction, dated.
• Editorial review. Editors may return an unverified complaint with notes before publication, and administrators may seal a case where the law requires it. Each such action is a docket entry visible to the parties.

Presenting the complaint well

A stranger who has never heard of your matter should be able to read the docket page in ten minutes and understand what happened, what you say was wrong, and what document shows it. Some habits that produce that result:

• Put the single most important document first (Exhibit A) and make sure the first allegation rests on it.
• Keep allegations to the conduct of the person named. A judge's ruling you think was wrong is not misconduct; a judge's ex parte call to opposing counsel is. The policy page has examples.
• Where the person has been a party to other cases, criminal, civil, or disciplinary, cite the public record of those cases as linked exhibits (the court's docket, the decision, the disciplinary ruling) and say in the allegation why it bears on the conduct complained of.
• Separate what the official body did with your complaint from the underlying conduct. "The Statewide Grievance Committee dismissed the complaint without a hearing on 3 March 2025 (Exhibit F)" is its own allegation, and often the most important one on this docket.
• Use the respondent's own documents wherever you can: the invoice, the letter, the filing. They answer themselves.
• Resist the urge to file everything. Twelve exhibits that each prove one thing beat forty that prove the same three.
• Before you file, read the complaint as the respondent will: every sentence you cannot support with an exhibit or your own direct knowledge is a sentence they will use.

Checklist

1. Account registered and email confirmed.
2. Documents collected, redacted, and converted to PDF where possible; one document per file; each under 25 MB.
3. Docketing Statement complete: your details, the respondent, relationship, dates and matter, conduct summary, injury summary, every prior complaint and its outcome.
4. Statement submitted; approval received; docket number assigned.
5. Statement of facts written chronologically with exhibit citations in the text.
6. Allegations numbered, one act each, dated.
7. Exhibits uploaded in narrative order, each with a dated title, a note on what it shows, and its source.
8. Every allegation linked to at least one exhibit.
9. Title and summary written in neutral terms.
10. Complaint and exhibits reviewed with your own counsel; decision to publish made.
11. Attestation read; verification signed (or notarized affidavit uploaded and selected).
12. Filed. Watch for the respondent's answer and file supplements as the matter develops.

Open the complaint builder   Read the content policy