PRYOR FOR REOPENING

Bill Barner, president of BACDL, sent the following email earlier this morning to the BACDL list serve:

Good morning. Yesterday I spoke with our incoming state attorney, Mr. Pryor. He is interested in beginning in-person hearings on a limited basis. He wants to know if our attorneys would want to begin non-jury evidentiary hearings such as stand-your-ground, VOPs, and Motion to Suppress. The idea would be to space out hearings so that there are limited people in any one courtroom at a time and to wear masks and practice social distancing.

We would need the chief judge and the clerk to agree. But Mr. Pryor wants to measure our interest in the meantime.

Please respond to me as soon as possible with your thoughts.

Bill Barner

This would mark the first notice since March when a litigation stakeholder, incoming or otherwise, despite only two Zoom links for in-custody hearings more than nine months into the pandemic, has publicly expressed willingness to reopen the courthouse …