Members of the community:

In light of current conditions and advice from public health officials, we have taken additional steps to
respond to the coronavirus emergency by doing our part to reduce the spread of the virus.

Fortunately, much of the work of the court can be conducted electronically, so we can continue most
operations without direct interpersonal contact. We’ll have personnel at the court to maintain our essential
functions, but many court personnel are teleworking to reduce interpersonal contact among court
employees. And we will avoid most in-court proceedings during the emergency.

We have suspended all jury trials, civil and criminal, for two months, through May 18, 2020. We’ll issue
specific orders in the affected civil cases, but pretrial deadlines will remain in place. We want the cases
affected by this suspension to be ready for trial as soon as we are able to reschedule them.

Most of our in-court proceedings occur in criminal cases, so we have taken steps to significantly reduce
the number of those proceedings. The court remains open for proceedings necessary to address threats to
public safety.

The coronavirus emergency may impede work on our cases in ways that we can’t anticipate. So litigants
or counsel may request relief from a specific deadline with a motion that explains the circumstances that
warrant relief.

The court will continue to monitor public health information and we will take additional steps as
appropriate. Thank you for your cooperation during these extraordinary times.
 

Sincerely,
James D. Peterson
Chief District Judge