eCourts vendor Tyler Technologies agrees to proposed $1.5 million settlement over wrongful arrests and jail stays in North Carolina

As of 9:28 a.m. ET, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026

Tyler Technologies, the company behind North Carolina's eCourts system, would set aside up to $1.5 million to pay people who say they were wrongly arrested or held in jail too long because of the system's errors, under a proposed class-action settlement filed in federal court Monday.

The company denies any wrongdoing, WRAL News reported. The deal is not final: the plaintiffs have asked the court for preliminary approval.

What the deal would pay

Under the proposal, eligible people could receive $500 to $5,000 for over-detention claims, and up to $2,800 for qualifying wrongful-arrest claims, according to WRAL. Claimants would have to submit supporting documents, and an independent administrator would review every claim, WRAL reported.

The $1.5 million is a cap on payments for valid claims. Tyler would separately pay attorneys' fees and expenses, service awards and the cost of notice and administration, the plaintiffs' lawyers wrote in a court filing quoted by the Carolina Journal. Defendant Tyler "has argued that Plaintiffs fail to state any viable negligence claim, and that its software did not cause the alleged harms," the filing said, according to the Carolina Journal.

The case

The lawsuit, Chaplin v. Rowe, was filed in May 2023 in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina and is assigned to U.S. District Judge L. Osteen Jr., according to the court docket. The docket shows the settlement motion, the settlement agreement and claim forms for over-detention and wrongful arrest filed on Oct. 26, after the case was reported settled as to Tyler in September.

The suit accused the eCourts system of keeping people in jail longer than they should have been and of leading to hundreds of people being arrested "for things they did not do," WRAL reported. Early on, the related eWarrants system showed some warrants as still active after people had already been taken into custody or had their cases dismissed, according to WRAL.

North Carolina began rolling out eCourts, which uses the Odyssey system, in 2023 in four pilot counties, including Wake County, according to WRAL.

The case would continue against Mecklenburg County Sheriff Garry McFadden and his insurer, the Carolina Journal reported. Earlier in the case, the plaintiffs dropped claims against state court officials, several court clerks and the Lee County sheriff, and the judge dismissed claims against the Wake County sheriff, the paper reported.

WRAL said it had asked Tyler Technologies for comment and was waiting to hear back. The claims against Tyler have not been proven in court.