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Trial moves to federal court due to outages
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Posted on Aug 26 2008
A Superior Court jury trial has been moved to the U.S. District Court due to power outages and a lack of generator fuel.
Superior Court Judge David Wiseman, who is presiding over the case, worked with U.S. District Court NMI Chief Judge Alex R. Munson to make the move, said Virginia Gridley, spokeswoman for the Superior Court.
“We want to thank Judge Munson for this courtesy,” she added.
She said the Superior Court would continue to use the federal courthouse until further notice.
The Superior Courthouse had just a few hours of power Monday, and because of a lack of funds to buy more generator fuel, the court is rationing the fuel and only turning it on for one hour a day, Gridley said.
The court is using 50 gallons of fuel per hour and has 1,000 gallons left, she said.
Court officials are exploring other options and have been in contact with Antonio Muña, executive director of the Commonwealth Utilities Corp., Gridley said.
“We understand the severity of this situation,” she added.
Gridley said she could not go into details about the options officials are exploring.
Last week, Wiseman said the interruptions were forcing him to change his court calendar, a task that could have many repercussions, he said.
