Jurors await the call at home. Masks are a must.

As COVID-19 surges, Broward, Palm Beach courts try to stay safe

Jury service has changed, mask mandates are back, remote hearings are on the rebound. And while South Florida courthouses aren’t exactly closed, the welcome mat isn’t out either.

Nearly two dozen lawyers, bailiffs, jurors, support staff and visitors to the Broward courthouse have tested positive for COVID-19 or are waiting for results, raising questions about how safe it is to be in the rooms where justice unfolds.

“Every day I get a call from another judge,” said Broward Chief Administrative Judge Jack Tuter. “It’s been a struggle.”

Courthouses throughout the state reopened to the public in piecemeal fashion after last year’s lockdown. Palm Beach County resumed jury service last September, before vaccines were available. Broward waited until the spring.

But Florida has been among the states hardest hit by the latest wave of coronavirus cases, reporting an average of more than 20,000 new cases a day as of Aug. 11.

And the resurgence in cases has forced both counties to rethink the return to normal. Courthouses in both Broward and Palm Beach counties are open to the public, but masks are no longer optional, regardless of vaccination status.

Jurors have been affected too. Before the pandemic, citizens called for jury duty were herded into a large room where they waited for their numbers to be called so they could be escorted to a judge’s courtroom to be considered for a particular trial.

Now, said Tuter, jurors do

the waiting at home. “On the summons, we give them a number to call the day before. If a judge needs them for a trial, they are to report the next day. Otherwise, they don’t have to come in.”

The result is that the hallways are emptier than they were even a month ago. It’s by design. Both court circuits issued administrative orders aimed at reducing foot traffic and limiting in-person appearances to the most necessary proceedings.

“If a courtroom is open and you’re wearing a mask, they’ll let you in,” Tuter said of observers in Broward’s courtrooms. But they shouldn’t expect to see much. The majority of pretrial hearings have been moved back online, a push that came from lawyers who found remote hearings preferable with or without a pandemic.

“It’s a more efficient way to drive the train,” said Jason B. Blank, chairman of the Criminal Law Section of the Florida Bar. “The continued use of remote technology for nonessential hearings is imperative.”

But the COVID resurgence has complicated the push to resume trials. While some civil trials have

gone forward, many have been stopped because a lawyer, a juror or some other employee in the courtroom has reported either a positive test or COVID-like symptoms.

Broward Public Defender Gordon Weekes said he’s aware of one attorney in his office who tested positive. People who worked in the same courtroom were notified and the attorney

self-quarantined.

It’s not clear whether COVID is spreading in the courthouse. Weekes said most reports of exposure from his employees are of people who suspect they’ve come into contact with the virus outside the courthouse, worried that they’re bringing COVID in.

False alarms tell part of the story in Broward. Multiple judges closed courtrooms in the middle of the day in late July and early August after learning that someone had been exposed or was showing symptoms. Tuter said last week that those closures all stemmed from false alarms.

Since then, two dozen other cases have been listed on the court’s COVID-19 Advisory web page, the majority confirmed positives.

Not included on the list is Broward bailiff Edwin Sanchez, 61, who died Aug. 6 while fighting COVID.

The Broward Sheriff’s Office confirmed Sanchez’s death and diagnosis on Thursday. He was on leave at the time; his last day at work was July 23.