§ 3-302. Indexes

   (a) In general. -- The clerk of the circuit court of each county shall make and maintain a full and complete general alphabetical index of every deed, and other instrument in a well-bound book in his office. The index shall be both in the name of each grantor, donor, mortgagor, and assignor, and each grantee, donee, mortgagee, or assignee. It shall include the book and page of the recordation of every instrument designating these names. The clerk shall index every deed or other instrument retaining a vendor's lien both as a deed and as a vendor's lien, in the same manner as mortgages are indexed.

(b) Indexing of assignments and releases of mortgages and deeds of trust. -- In every clerk's office where land records are not recorded in book form, the clerk shall index every assignment of a mortgage, deed of trust, and release or partial releases of a deed of trust, whether in long or short form, in the general alphabetical index, and shall place an entry in the general alphabetical index where the instrument is indexed, on the same horizontal line, indicating the place of record of the original instrument being assigned or released.

(c) Dating changes or corrections. -- The clerk of the circuit court of each county shall date each change or correction made to information in the general alphabetical index on the horizontal line on which the change or correction was made.

(d) Indexing decrees against plaintiff. -- If a court of equity decrees a payment of cost or makes some other decree for payment of money by a plaintiff, the clerk immediately shall enter the plaintiff's name in a separate index, known as the index of plaintiffs. Until the plaintiff's name is indexed, no lien under the decree arises against the property of the plaintiff and no right of execution accrues on the decree.

(e) Indexing property identifiers. --

   (1) The clerk shall include in the index each property identifier provided on an intake sheet under § 3-104(g) of this title or, if the space available in the index will not accommodate all of the identifiers, then as many as the space allows, giving priority to identifiers in the order in which they are listed in § 3-104(g)(3)(i) of this title.

   (2) The clerk shall rely on the instrument that is accompanied by the intake sheet for indexing of grantor's and grantee's names.

HISTORY: An. Code 1957, art. 21, § 3-302; 1974, ch. 12, § 2; 1982, ch. 820, § 3; 1989, ch. 400; 1994, ch. 316.