A Court's Nightmare

• Jurisdiction: Georgia,United States
• Citation: Vol. 15 No. 2 Pg. 0036
• Publication year: 2009
• Pages: 0036
• Year: 2009
• topic: Health Law,Civil Procedure,Public Sector Law

A Court's Nightmare No. Vol. 15, No. 2, Pg. 36 Georgia Bar Journal October, 2009

GBJ Feature

A Court's Nightmare

by Chief Justice Carol Hunstein and Justice Harold Melton

It's Monday morning, Nov. 9, 2009. You arrive at work a few minutes before 8 a.m., grateful you still have a job and relieved that last week's election is behind you. This is the first year as a superior court judge that you had a bona fide challenger, but you prevailed. As you unlock the door to your chambers, the phone on your secretary's desk is ringing. You answer, a little surprised she's not in yet. The first call is from a citizen who has been summoned for jury duty and wants to know where and when he should report. You cant even get the coffee maker going before the phone rings again. Where is your secretary? This time, it's your clerk. Her daughter is sick—very sick—and they are on their way to the emergency room. But you have court today, and you haven't a clue how to access the case management system. Who will print out the docket so you know which case comes first? The phone is now ringing rapid-fire. Another call from a member of the public: He has a DUI before the court today, but given the governor's announcement last night, he's asking if there will even be court today.

"What announcement?" you ask.

For more than a year, the Georgia Judicial Emergency Management Committee has been working hard to make sure that our courts could continue to operate in the event of a global pandemic. Chaired by Justice Harold Melton, the Committee has created tools that are now available to help you prepare. Whether you are a judge, clerk, court administrator, sheriff, parole officer or some other officer of the judicial system, if you have not yet put in writing a plan to respond, wait much longer, and it may be too late.

Consider the news since spring: April 21, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announces that an unknown strain of swine flu has popped up in two people in California. Three days later, Mexico announces hundreds of cases and 68

deaths. June 12, in a stunning announcement, the World Health Organization (WHO) declares the seven-week old "H1N1" swine flu virus a global pandemic, meaning that it is now capable of infecting as much as one-third of the world's population. By mid-June, the United States has 13,000 cases. But other, more reassuring, accounts soon follow: stories that the virus is less lethal than initially expected and news that a vaccine could soon be available. We were lucky, some experts say, because that first surge hit at the end of the school year. But by mid-summer, the news again shifts. July 13: The virus needed for the vaccine is growing half as fast as ordinary strains. It is unlikely a...