04/03/2020
Today the North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice extended the prior court shutdown order to be effective until June 1, 2020. I’ve attached a link to the website below which contains a summary and the full order. This means that practically any and all cases, hearings, and motions that had court dates before June 1, 2020 have now been continued. Practically speaking the only cases that can continue, other than some minor criminal issues, are domestic violence orders of protection and emergency custody motions. Even child support issues, despite how desperate in nature they might be, are being pushed back. Additionally, it appears that the filing deadlines and response deadlines for everything will also be extended, including discovery. There are other exceptions to this and if you have questions pertaining to your specific case please reach out to us.
I know this will be difficult for many of you, but we will do whatever is possible to ensure you have a court date as fast as possible once things resume. In the meantime, our staff remains dedicated to working on your cases and doing all we can to push them along given the new deadlines. We will also be reaching out to opposing counsel to try and encourage them to go through mediation or even arbitration for those of you who have cases conducive to that type of proceeding. Not everyone’s case would benefit from that though, so we will hand-select those we think might be a good fit. If the opposing attorney agrees we will reach out to you on a case by case basis to offer options on how to proceed.
In this unprecedented time, I’m sure you all have a lot of questions about your individual situations, and I can assure you we are working hard to answer them. Feel free to email us and we will try to respond to them as fast as we can. Additionally, Zoom or phone meetings are available to you all. Please call the office to schedule those. Thank you and we hope everyone stays safe.
Link to this new order:
Chief Justice Beasley's order contains seven directives including the postponement of court proceedings until June 1, 2020.