District Court (Second District)

Criminal case files, 1855-1895.

View history of records' creator.

Schedule Description

These case files document criminal cases handled in Beaver County. Case 31 is the John D. Lee trial concerning the Mountain Meadows Massacre.

Scope and Content

Case files document criminal cases as they proceed through the court system and subsequently become the official files of individual cases. Recurrent criminal offenses include theft, larceny, perjury, forgery, libel, mayhem, kidnapping, murder, assault, contempt, unlawful cohabitation, etc. A criminal case is initiated with a complaint, indictment, or arrest warrant. Individual case files may include petitions to the court, complaints, warrants of execution and confinement, warrant of death, notices of appeal, subpoenas, attachments, affidavits, trial evidence, remittitur, jury lists and memorandum of costs. Case 31 is the John D. Lee trial concerning his involvement in the 1857 Mountain Meadows Massacre.

Notes

Box 5 is arranged alphabetically by County, and thereunder chronologically by year and alphabetically by defendant.

Gaps in holdings are numerous and the numbering is inconsistent throughout.

This series was archivally processed by Jim Kichas and Emily Gurr in May 2008 as part of a NHPRC grant project designed to preserve the historic records of Utah's Fifth District Courts.

Box 5 was archivally processed by Curt Kelley in May of 2018. These files have not been microfilmed and have been added to the end of the series as all other records have been microfilmed.

The vast majority of the cases involving polygamy and related charges have been removed and are located at The National Archives, Rocky Mountain Region, located in Denver, Colorado.