Did you know you can look up peoples' court records online?
Some states might not allow this, but in Ohio, most of our courts host online records or dockets, and it's quite a simple manner to find out lots of things about that dental group you're thinking about switching to, or if you have any outstanding warrants, or...oh, I don't know...maybe someone you're going into business with, or someone you have gone into business with in the past.

I learned these mad searching skills at work, and I have to say that this is my favorite job skill of all time, even beating out my ability to shoot the spring from my stapler over the partial wall and into the face of someone in Processing.

Before you think about searching court websites, you might want to learn a little about courts. Each county is going to have a Common Pleas Court, and then certain cities will have a Municipal court. For example, in Cleveland there is the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, but some cases are tried under the Cleveland Heights Municipal court. Or under the Parma Municipal court. There's a simple way to find out where the courts are located. Go to the Supreme Court of [your state]. See if they have a list of all the courts in the state. In Ohio, you can pull up a list of all the trial courts organized by county. Now, you need to know the county the person you're researching lives in. Google can provide that fairly easily. You also might want to search some of the major metropolitan areas, or the county they work in, in case they were once sued in connection with an employer or a tax-shelter style business, not that I am thinking of anyone particular here.

The other day I searched my own name and was particularly vexed to find that there is another lady with my name living in this city who has quite a record for Theft. And before you roll your eyes and say "yeah right, what about that stealin' bag you're so proud of?" let me remind you that 1)I usually sing a little song about what I'm stealing to the person I'm stealing it from, thus making it slightly less "illegal," and 2)my middle initial is not "R."

Anyway, I think this is something people need to know about, because if you're ever thinking of doing online dating, or really any sort of real-life business transaction, you should probably look out for your safety and your best interest and just do a little fully legal snooping around.