3.22 Transmission of papers

When a preliminary hearing wraps up (or the defendant skips that hearing by waiving it), and the judge decides the case should move forward, the court clerk has a job to do. The clerk must send all the paperwork from the case to the clerk of the higher court that will now handle it.

The clerk also has to send a copy of all those same papers to the Commonwealth's Attorney, who is the prosecutor handling the case. This makes sure both the new court and the prosecutor have everything they need to keep the case moving without delay.

This rule is mostly about making sure information gets passed along correctly between courts and officials. For a defendant, it means their case file follows them to the next stage of the legal process, and the prosecutor stays in the loop with full access to what happened at the preliminary hearing.