SATURDAY UPDATE

Cancelled Friday Docket – to be handled Tuesday. If you had a previously scheduled Tuesday hearing, check to see if it’s still on …

Thanks to Anonymous at 2:07 PM today for the following alert. As reported previously, First Appearances and Emergency Dockets are being transformed to a Zoom platform to limit further exposure in the jails. The logistics for generating emailed meeting invites and other procedural issues are still being ironed out, and the whole scramble to keep courts up and running means any type of broadcast may be a casualty for the short term …

In the meantime, the Public Defender’s Office has sent this letter to Greg Tony and Mike Satz, hoping to stay ahead of the in-custody Covid-19 time bomb. The following specific suggestions and common sense recommendations have been made:

Lastly, the JQC, remotely or not, is still hard at work. Here are the formal charges and recommended discipline for Hamilton County’s Sonny Scaff, who admitted to not following statutes and rules governing First Appearances by holding telephonic, ex parte hearings, amongst other things, after having been “previously cautioned” by the JQC. In light of his acceptance of responsibility and the following implemented fixes, Scaff and the JQC are hoping the Supreme Court will go along with a public reprimand …