St. Mary Parish Clerk Office
The current Clerk is Greg Aucoin. The official Clerk homepage identifies "Greg Aucoin, Clerk of Court" and states that the Clerk and staff provide court and public-record services to St. Mary Parish citizens. Local reporting states that Gregory P. Aucoin was sworn in effective July 1, 2024, after longtime Clerk Cliff Dressel retired after 59 years of service as Clerk and Chief Deputy Clerk. Current record requests should use Aucoin as the officeholder and treat Dressel details as office history.
St. Mary Parish Clerk of Court
500 Main Street, Suite 201
Franklin, LA 70538
(337) 828-4100
Mon-Fri 8:30 AM-4:30 PM, excluding holidays
The Clerk's office is the local custodian for civil, criminal, probate, marriage, mortgage, conveyance, and related public records. It also handles marriage licenses, passports, birth and death certificate applications during limited daily windows, election commissioner functions, forms, fees, jury duty information, and links to electronic filing and recording systems.
St. Mary Clerk Records
The Clerk's online material shows a broad office, not a single court counter. eSearch covers indexes for conveyances, mortgages, civil suits, criminal, probate, marriages, bonds, chattel mortgages, incorporations, miscellaneous, notarial adoptions, oaths, and partnerships. Court users should pay close attention to the difference between index access and document access. Verdict Civil/Probate and Verdict Criminal Index and Docket History can be searched, but pleadings filed in the record cannot be viewed through that public-facing eSearch path.
The Clerk's service and office description appears in the official St. Mary Parish Clerk about page.
The source supports the office-wide role of the Clerk, including court records, case filings, marriage licenses, and jury duty.
Search St. Mary Clerk Records
The main online access route is the St. Mary Parish Clerk eSearch portal. It is a COTT-hosted portal for indexes and docket history, but it requires account access and paid subscription service for searching and printing. eClerks/eVault Louisiana and LCRAA are useful for land and marriage access, but they do not turn the Clerk's civil, probate, or criminal pleading files into public image databases.
| Field Label | Type | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| User ID | Text | Yes | Account sign-in field. |
| Password | Password | Yes | Case-sensitive; new passwords need at least 10 characters with upper, lower, and special character rules. |
| Password Reminder | Link | No | Password recovery link under the login box. |
| Create an Account | Link | No | Registration, terms, subscription selection, and credit-card payment. |
| Certified Dates | Utility link | No | Recommended before searching to review index coverage and statistics. |
The official records warning should not be skipped. The eSearch page warns that online records are not official, that the office does not certify online accuracy, and that only official public records provided in the Clerk's office should be referenced as official. Online images are limited to conveyance and mortgage records in the observed material, with no civil, probate, or criminal pleading images available through the court-record search.
St. Mary Clerk Fees
The Clerk's forms and fees page links civil, criminal, recording, credit-card, and eFiling resources. Failed manifest rows for PDF fee schedules were not used as images, but the researched fee amounts are used in the table below.
| Clerk Fee or Deposit | Amount or Note |
|---|---|
| Damages, injuries, open account, promissory note, executory process, partitions | $450 advance deposit |
| Additional defendant | $100 |
| Divorce | $450 advance deposit |
| Custody, support, contempt rules; garnishments | $400 |
| Successions/probates; tutorships | $350 |
| Small succession, no judgment recorded | $250 |
| Small succession, judgment recorded | $300 |
| Civil copies | $2 per page |
| Certification | $5 |
| Conformed copy | $3 |
| Minute entries | $5 |
| Marriage license | $35, including two certified copies after officiant return |
| eSearch subscriptions | $750 annual, $400 six-month, $125 thirty-day, $20 one-day |
The forms and fee source appears in the St. Mary Parish Clerk forms and fees page.
The image source is tied to official Clerk forms, fees, mortgage forms, civil forms, criminal forms, eFiling, and related service links.
Request St. Mary Certified Copies
Certified copies should be requested from the Clerk when the document must be used in court, for a legal filing, for title work, for a name change, or for an official proof purpose. A printed online index page is not the same thing as a certified copy. The request should give the Clerk enough information to locate the record and enough instruction to prepare the right copy type.
- Identify the record type, such as civil suit, criminal docket, succession, marriage, conveyance, mortgage, judgment, or minute entry.
- Collect the case number, party names, decedent name, marriage names, filing date, book/page, or other known locator.
- Tell the Clerk whether a plain copy, conformed copy, certified copy, or minute entry is needed.
- Confirm page counts, certification cost, payment method, mailing method, and whether restrictions apply.
- Use the Clerk's official copy instead of treating eSearch material as the controlling record.
Note: If a case involves juvenile, adoption, sealed, expunged, minor, or protected personal information, the Clerk may restrict access or require authority beyond a public request.
St. Mary Records Request Fields
No single public request form was located for every Clerk record type, so the inventory below follows the actual information needed to request a copy from the record office. More detail reduces misidentification, especially when names are common or a case is not yet released online.
| Field | Required | Why It Matters |
|---|---|---|
| Record type | Yes | Routes the request to civil, criminal, probate, marriage, mortgage, conveyance, or another index. |
| Party, spouse, decedent, or grantor/grantee names | Yes | Primary way to identify most Clerk records. |
| Case, license, book/page, or filing number | No | Speeds the search and lowers risk of pulling the wrong record. |
| Approximate date | No | Helps when index coverage or release status varies. |
| Document name | Yes | Examples include judgment, petition, marriage certificate, minute entry, mortgage, or judgment of possession. |
| Copy type | Yes | Plain, conformed, certified, or minute entry copies use different fee lines. |
| Return method and payment | Yes | Needed for mail, pickup, and fee handling. |
Marriage Jury and Filing
The Clerk issues marriage licenses, and the St. Mary license fee includes two certified copies after the officiant returns the completed license. Applicants must email supporting documents to the Clerk rather than submit them through the LCRAA application site. The Clerk also links to Tybera for civil and criminal eFiling and provides eRecording through eClerk, but the office states that mortgage cancellations, wills, and maps or plats cannot be accepted electronically.
Jury service is another Clerk-facing function. Jurors are told to call after 6:00 PM the day before service at (337) 828-4238 or (337) 828-4100 option 6. They report to the sixth floor of the St. Mary Parish Courthouse as instructed. The Clerk's jury rules prohibit cell phones, iPads, recording devices, electronic communication devices, and cameras on the courtroom floor. Dress rules bar shorts and tank tops, require belts when pants have belt loops, and call for clothing that preserves court dignity.
Jury instructions appear in the St. Mary Parish Clerk jury duty page.
The jury source ties the Clerk page to courthouse access rules, sixth-floor reporting, and courtroom restrictions.
St. Mary Clerk History
Clerk history is unusually well documented in the research. Cliff Dressel served St. Mary Parish for 59 years as Clerk and Chief Deputy Clerk before retiring at the end of his term on June 30, 2024. Local reporting said he was elected for 10 consecutive terms and was the only Clerk of Court elected president of the Louisiana Clerks of Court Association for two terms. Gregory P. Aucoin then took office effective July 1, 2024.
The Dressel history appears in the local report on former Clerk Cliff Dressel.
The history source should not change current record routing, but it explains the office transition behind current Clerk Greg Aucoin's administration.