Five people who work at the Jefferson County Courthouse in Hillsboro have tested positive for COVID-19, and people who were there recently may have been exposed to the virus.
Deputy Presiding Judge Brenda Stacey said Sheriff Dave Marshak confirmed that four Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office employees and a lawyer in private practice tested positive for the virus over the past week.
Stacey ordered the cancellation of all in-person hearings set for Tuesday (July 21) at the county Courthouse, with judges directed to proceed with video-conferencing hearings at their discretion.
Stacey said the Jefferson County Health Department is conducting contract tracing involving the people who tested positive.
Because of privacy concerns, those individuals are not identified. They are quarantining at home, Stacey and Marshak said.
After officials received word of the first positive case late in the afternoon July 13, Stacey issued an order suspending business at the county Courthouse on July 14 so it could be disinfected. Court operations resumed on July 15, but after the subsequent positive test results, she issued an executive order on July 18 ordering legal hearings in the county’s 23rd Circuit to be held mostly on video conference calls, as they were in mid-March and in April after various stay-at-home orders dealing with the pandemic were put into place.
Under operating directives issued by the Missouri Supreme Court, the Courthouse will remain under those restrictions – referred to as Phase Zero – for at least 14 days, unless more positive cases are identified.
Marshak said 15 of his employees were tested for the virus after the Courthouse reopened on July 14, and at the Leader deadline on Monday, at least one test had come back as a positive. That person was the fourth Sheriff’s Office employee who tested positive for the virus.
Marshak said his first employee tested positive over the weekend of July 11-12 and informed superiors of the test on July 13.
“Upon verifying the information, we notified the judges and the circuit clerk,” Marshak said.
Stacey said the second Sheriff’s Office employee who tested positive was a bailiff.
She said the bailiff told authorities about having COVID-19 symptoms on July 13 before going home, so anyone on the first floor of the Courthouse or in the Div. 15 courtroom on that day may have been exposed. That bailiff had been assigned to the Div. 2 courtroom from July 6-9.
The lawyer who self-reported his positive test told authorities that while he was in the Courthouse on July 10, he wore a mask at all times and practiced social distancing, but spent about 90 minutes in the second-floor hallway and less than 15 minutes in Div. 4. A memo issued by Stacey noted that under Health Department guidelines, it is not likely the attorney infected others.
Information is not available on where the third Sheriff’s Office employee worked in the Courthouse before notifying his office on July 17 that he or she also tested positive. That employee worked at the Courthouse on July 13 and was sent home early the next day after reporting symptoms.
Not much information is available on the fourth Sheriff’s Office employee, who was tested on July 15 and was told he had tested positive on Monday. However, Stacey said he was in her Div. 4 courtroom on July 16.
According to information released by the circuit, those who were in the Courthouse on July 8, July 9 or July 13, particularly those in Div. 2 and Div. 15, are advised to self-quarantine and wait for a Health Department staff member to give further instructions while contact tracing.
Marshak said his employees have been instructed not to report for work if they believe they have symptoms of the coronavirus.
“No Sheriff’s Office employee has ever been required to work with COVID symptoms despite the rumors that have consistently circled around the Courthouse since March,” he said.
Marshak said because of reduction of in-person hearings, more deputies are available to cover for others who may have an illness.
Public Works Director Jason Jonas, whose department handles building maintenance issues, said he was informed of the first positive case at the Courthouse late in the afternoon of July 13.
“Since April 1, we have been disinfecting each of the county buildings once every two weeks,” he said. “The Courthouse was scheduled for that on July 17, but once I got the word late (July 13) about the positive case, we just moved that up a few days.
“This is a CDC-approved process that involves an electrostatic fogger. It cleans every surface 100 percent.”
Attorney has doubts about response
At least one attorney said she doesn’t think the situation at the Courthouse has been handled properly.
“In my opinion, the Courthouse should have been shut down to see how many people test positive before anyone’s allowed back in,” said Allison Sweeney, a Hillsboro-based attorney. “I’m concerned for the public safety.”
Sweeney said she wanted to immediately share the news about the first positive case with other attorneys as part of her role as president of the Jefferson County Bar Association, but felt she couldn’t.
“I was not told this directly, but I feel I was discouraged by the judiciary from sharing the information with my fellow attorneys,” Sweeney said. “I told the judge that I was going public, that this information is too serious to sit on, that we should be thinking of how many people this could affect.”
Stacey said she has spoken with Sweeney about her concerns.
“She’s angry. I get that. But I can’t deal with rumors and shut an entire circuit down based on hearsay. That would be unjudicial of me. After I was told of the first positive case, we moved to shut the building down almost immediately. The county came out and started fogging at 10 a.m. on (July 14). After I spoke with the two individuals involved (in other positives), I decided that we had to go back to Phase Zero. It’s a difficult decision to shut down the place. People want their cases resolved. It’s not done as a casual thing, but it was the correct thing to do given the information at hand.”
Stacey said she also had concerns about setting off a public panic.
“The Health Department is in charge of doing contract tracing. If we had come out and said that everyone who was in the Courthouse needed to be tested, the Health Department might have had to take hundreds of calls. As soon as we had confirmed information, we let everybody know what they needed to know.”
Sweeney also said some court officials and judges have not taken the preventive guidelines concerning the coronavirus seriously.
“They’re not social distancing,” she said. “I’ve been told by attorneys they are sometimes mocked by bailiffs and judges for wearing masks in courtrooms.”
Stacey said she has not seen that.
“I’m not in everyone else’s courtroom, but I wear a mask in public. I don’t on the bench so I can be heard, but Plexiglas has been installed in courtrooms for clerks and court reporters. Most of the judges I know wear masks.”
Stacey’s order mandates that all in-person hearings be conducted with the social distancing of 6 feet and with a limit of 25 people in a courtroom. The order also says divisions with smaller courtrooms may move to a larger venue.
Circuit Clerk Mike Reuter said he, too, believes those at the Courthouse are taking preventive measures to stem the spread of the virus.
“I think everyone is following safety guidelines,” he said. “There are 6-foot marks on the floor. They’re only allowing so many people to come into a room.
“A couple of weeks ago, we started a system where people who entered the Courthouse for a hearing were given a card at the door, and the card had information about how to text the clerk for the division they are waiting (for) in the parking lot,” Reuter said. “They then are texted when they can come in. I think that’s working well.”
