The San Diego Superior Court has added to the list of time-sensitive, essential functions that are available to provide additional emergency services during the COVID-19 Court Service Suspension. Effective March 24, 2020, the additional following services are now available:

To ensure all Court users understand what is available and what is impacted during the San Diego Superior Court’s service interruption, the Court will provide updates to the community as new information becomes available. To the extent this notice conflicts with any previous notices, the most current update shall govern.

In light of the Public Health Department’s weekend guidance of no more than 50 people in a room, the San Diego Superior Court is now asking all County residents summoned to appear the week of March 16th -19th in the Superior Court not to come to the courthouse. “Our community’s health is important to us all and while we had COVID-19 procedures in place to provide enough social distancing for summoned jurors in our jury services room, having a jury pool of 50 people will not provide us with enough people for fair trials,” says San Diego Superior Court Presiding Judge Lorna Alksne.

In an effort to promote the health and safety of court users and employees as well as mitigate community spread of the Covid-19/Coronavirus, The San Diego Superior Court has suspended all non-emergency services effective March 17, 2020-April 3, 2020:

EXCEPT AS PROVIDED BELOW, THE COURT WILL BE CLOSED FOR:

CRIMINAL

• All criminal proceedings including arraignments, readiness, pre-trial motions, trials and sentencing.

CIVIL

The San Diego Superior Court has developed procedures to ensure it is following the recommendations of State and County Public Health officials to ensure a safe environment for employees and Court users and to mitigate the spread of the Coronavirus (COVID-19). The measures include: 

San Diego’s North County Superior Court continues its tradition of bringing students to the courthouse to talk about modern issues and their legal consequences during the 19th Annual Youth in Court Day. The event, sponsored by the North County Division of the San Diego Superior Court in conjunction with the North County Bar Assocation and The Lawyer Referral Service, will be held on Friday, March 6, 2020. More than 900 students are expected to attend the day-long event where they will be introduced to the court system to learn about present day problems that pass through the courthouse.

More than 600 Students Participated in Annual Program Cathedral Catholic High School’s Mock Trial team outperformed 31 other County High Schools to win the annual legal competition. The San Diego County Mock Trial program provides high school students with actual experience in courtrooms rather than learning about the rule of law from books and lectures. The student teams undertake the roles of lawyers and witnesses facing off on a hypothetical case in front of actual state and federal judges. The fourday competition was held at the downtown courthouse over the past three weeks.

Starting Monday, March 2, 2020 North County residents will no longer be required to drive to downtown San Diego to file their Probate matters. A dedicated Probate counter will be open in the Court’s Family/Civil Business Office located at 325 Melrose Drive in Vista. Court services dealing with decedents' estates, trusts, guardianship of minors, and conservatorship of adults who are unable to provide for their personal needs or manage their financial resources, were discontinued at the North County courthouse in 2012 as the Superior Court faced historic budget cuts.

An imaginary case involving self-driving vehicle technology, civic activism and a murder has drawn hundreds of local high school students into courtrooms for the 14th Annual San Diego County High School Mock Trial Competition. The annual event, sponsored by the San Diego Superior Court, the San Diego County Bar Association, and Constitutional Rights Foundation (CRF), is a program that gives students hands-on experience in learning about the law and the Constitution. This year’s pretrial issue involves the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.