Honolulu First Circuit Court Filing Rules

Each document’s first page must use the specified form, except as provided in (d).

Conventionally filed documents requiring service must be accompanied by enough copies for service.

When the clerk electronically files a conventionally submitted paper document, the document’s receipt date and time are preserved as its filing date.

Conventionally filed pleadings and documents must use specified paper, margins, font, spacing, numbering, binding, and black-ink requirements.

For civil matters, the clerk must electronically file submitted paper documents and preserve the paper receipt date and time as the filing date.

The clerk must collect statutory costs and fees and the additional amounts specified in Rule 2.2.

A stipulated hearing reschedule must state the reason and be presented to the assigned judge at least 48 hours before the hearing.

Confidential-case documents and documents submitted under seal or sealed by court order must remain electronically secured and accessible only to specified participants until a court orders otherwise.

Support and opposition memoranda are limited to 20 pages, and reply memoranda to 10 pages, excluding affidavits, exhibits, and attachments.

Unless exempt under the Hawaiʻi circuit-court rules, the court must consult attorneys and self-represented parties at a scheduling conference and issue a scheduling order.

A party filing motion-related papers must deliver two file-stamped courtesy copies to the assigned judge’s chambers expeditiously, with attached exhibits appropriately tabbed.

Remote appearances are presumptively prohibited for trials, evidentiary hearings, contested matters, dispositive motions, and settlement conferences, subject to statutory or court exceptions.