The thirteen United States Courts of Appeals stand between the United States District Courts (or other comparable federal courts, such as the Court of International Trade) and the United States Supreme Court.
Each state has decided upon its own particular appellate structure.
In the state of New York, for example, the Court of Appeals is the highest court in the state and the court of last resort within the State. Only cases raising questions of federal law can be appealed from there to the United States Supreme Court. Similarly, in the District of Columbia, the Court of Appeals is equivalent to a state supreme court. Maryland also calls its highest court the Court of Appeals, with the intermediate appellate court having the name of the Court of Special Appeals.
In California, the intermediate appellate courts are known as the Courts of Appeal (note the lack of an ';s';).
In New Mexico, the Court of Appeals is the intermediate appellate court between county jurisdictions and the state's Supreme Court. Most states that have a Court of Appeals (or multiple Courts) give them a similar intermediate role.
In Nevada (and a few other states), there is no Court of Appeals. Cases are appealed directly from District (county) Courts to the state's Supreme Court. The state Supreme Court in that case must hear all appeals.
The general rule in the American justice system is that the loser deserves one appeal. Therefore, such intermediate courts usually have mandatory jurisdiction and must hear an appeal, while the state supreme court (or the U.S. Supreme Court in the federal system) has discretionary jurisdiction and hears an appeal only if it wants to. There exist some special exceptions to this rule. In some state courts, the state's supreme court is required by law to hear all appeals of a certain nature. These cases usually involve the death penalty or cases involving high-ranking government officials.What kind of cases does the Us courts of appeals handle?
US Court of Appeals handle the appeals tried by the lower courts. It also has original jurisdiction over petitions for mandamus, certiorari and other orders to stop the implementation of the judgement of lower courts.
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