Judges in the states' highest courts are required in all but three states to disclose some of their outside financial interests, a three-month study by the Center for Public Integrity has found. But these filings are rarely reviewed by the public, who may not even know they exist.

Center requests for copies of these documents were routinely met with surprise from the agencies that receive the filings. In some states, Center researchers were told that no one had ever asked to see the documents. All of the available filings are now on the Center's Web site.

While legislative and executive ethics agencies have made their records increasingly accessible to the public, judicial disclosure forms can be hard to track down.

The three states that do not require judges to report personal financial interests are Idaho, Montana and Utah. Four states — Alabama, Connecticut, Florida and Georgia — keep some filings confidential. Three other states — Alaska, Maryland and Nebraska — require an in-person appearance to view or receive copies of the disclosures.

Forty-seven states have some sort of financial disclosure rules for these judges. They all require judges to report some type of non-judicial income, while 39 ask judges to report any officer or director positions the judges hold in organizations. In 14 states, judges file disclosure forms similar to those required by governors and legislators. In 21 states, they use different filing forms.

In another 12 states judges must file more than one form of financial disclosure. In these states, the filings are required by state law and by the states' adopted version of the American Bar Association's Model Code of Judicial Conduct.>>