These days it seems like everything is taking place “virtually”. Remember the excitement of your first Facetime or Skype live conversation on your phone or laptop?

Now the business community is embracing video applications to get things done and keep their doors open using apps like Microsoft Teams and Zoom. Zoom meetings appear to be the standard for almost everyone. Even the court system in McHenry County has adapted and jumped on the Zoom bandwagon.

Last week, the McHenry County Circuit Court experimented with a few pilot programs allowing optional court appearances via Zoom.

For the first time, people were able to go to traffic court or divorce court from their kitchen table, literally!

The Judge made it very clear to everyone that the Zoom video court hearing was being recorded and broadcast via livestream. One of our litigation attorneys, Jean Butler, was lucky to be selected to be a participant (guinea pig?) for the exciting opportunity to appear in “virtual court”. Move over Judge Judy!

Fortunately, virtual court last week was relatively uneventful, although Drake Shunneson from our office did get a few smiles from some of his witty comments in virtual court on last Thursday morning.

Thankfully, all the participants were fully and appropriately clothed (for the most part) and there were no unsolicited background appearances, cats riding Roombas or other unexpected photobombs a/k/a Zoom-bombs (Zoombies? The Zoom-bie Apocalypse? You get the picture, oops, I mean video.)

While Zoom court won’t work for every matter, it is one tool that we may see used more and more in the future and could prove useful in clearing up court calendars and expediting hearings. We are excited to see how participating in Zoom Court will help us serve our clients better.

Stay Safe and Stay Healthy,

Adam

Adam J. Diamond

815-385-6840

adam@dlfirm.com