The ongoing federal government shutdown is starting to have dire consequences at Chicago’s Dirksen U.S. Courthouse, where money has run out to pay staff for non-essential duties and jury trials are being canceled amid growing uncertainty.
The shutdown, which began Oct. 1, initially affected only civil litigation involving the United States as a party since the court keeps a reserve of funds that allow most operations to continue.
On Friday, however, U.S. District Chief Judge Virginia Kendall said the U.S. District Courts in Chicago are now entering “Phase 2” of its shutdown operations, stopping salary payments to courthouse employees and reducing operations at the clerk’s office to only “excepted activities” such as Constitutional functions.
“I am concerned that the lack of appropriation will create delays in the Court’s ability to ensure timely justice,” Kendall said in a written statement. “Furthermore, the dedicated public servants, who allow those who seek redress prompt access to Court, are now feeling the pain of their paychecks being suspended and facing difficult financial decisions to keep their families afloat because of the shutdown.”
In one bit of good news, the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts notified all federal courts nationwide on Wednesday that there are sufficient funds to continue to pay jurors and grand jurors, according to Kendall’s statement.
“Therefore, all trials and grand jury sessions will continue as scheduled until such time as the AO determines that fees for jurors have been exhausted,” she said.
Despite that, judges in several criminal cases at the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse this week decided to move jury trials that were imminent to avoid having to shut it down in the middle of proceedings.
Among the cases postponed was that of Antoine Larry, a police officer in south suburban Phoenix who had been scheduled to go on trial on Wednesday on charges he shook down drug dealers for money.
Also canceled was the trial starting Wednesday of Jawad Fakroune, a Moroccan national accused of threatening and assaulting a Chicago restaurateur to collect a debt Fakroune claimed he was owed. In a minute order last week, U.S. District Judge Manish Shah said the “uncertainty” surrounding the lapse in appropriations could affect the ability to summon jurors in the near future.
“Although circumstances could change between now and (the start of trial), the court concludes that resetting the trial will allow the parties a better opportunity to reasonably and effectively prepare for the trial,” Shah wrote. Fakroune’s trial was reset for January.
While government shutdowns — and threatened ones — have affected the courts numerous times over the past decade and a half, the situation this year is the most serious since 2013, when federal workers who were deemed “essential” reported to work but went without paychecks until Congress later approved the money.
At the U.S. attorney’s office that year, about a third of its 300 employees — mostly from its civil litigation and support staff — were sent home during the budget stalemate. Most of the office’s approximately 125 criminal prosecutors are exempt from budget-related furloughs, and their work would not be affected.
Joseph Fitzpatrick, a spokesman for current U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros, said Friday the office had furloughed about a quarter of its staff, also mostly civil litigation and support employees.
How long the shutdown lasts this time around is anyone’s guess, but there is no doubt the money will run out eventually.
In 2013, then-U.S. District Chief Judge Ruben Castillo told the Tribune that if the stalemate hadn’t been resolved, he was prepared to send a doomsday email that would have halted all trials at the busy downtown courthouse because he had no more money to pay jurors and court-appointed attorneys or cover other costs of a trial.
Officials in Washington had told Castillo to give jurors IOUs for their service if necessary — something he refused to do.
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com
