ONSLOW COUNTY, N.C. -- Hurricane Florence destroyed many buildings throughout North Carolina and left some serious strains on the Onslow County court system as well.

  • Florence flooded the EW Summersill courthouse, closing six courtrooms for more than two months
  • Instead, court is now held all over the county including the Onslow County Government Building, Onslow DSS Health Department, Jacksonville Police Department, sheriff’s office and even Jacksonville City Hall
  • The new courthouse is under construction but could be open by February 2019

Florence flooded the EW Summersill courthouse, closing six courtrooms for more than two months. Despite not having the space, Onslow County came together to reopen three days later.

“By getting the court up and running as soon as we could, it helped alleviate some of the backlog that we would have had. Some of the other counties were down several weeks. And there are things with the court system that need to keep going, there are people in jail that need to get out. There are domestic violence victims that need protective orders,” says Lisa Brown, the Onslow County clerk of court.

Instead, court is now held all over the county including the Onslow County Government Building, Onslow DSS Health Department, Jacksonville Police Department, sheriff’s office and even Jacksonville City Hall.

“We've had a lack of court space, we've had to to compete for court space, criminal and civil. I have three assistant district attorneys assigned to district court that have been going back and forth to the government complex out on Highway 258,’’ says Ernie Lee, the district attorney for the county.

Lee says he will be starting a murder trial Tuesday that will tie up the original courthouse for about two weeks. Brown says she had to move 32 employees all over the county, and now people have to go to a different location to pay fees than they do to deal with paperwork.

“They've been a little frustrated as you can expect, because there's really been no way for us to get the message out, when they go there first, then they're redirected here, so it’s really been a frustrating time for the public,” says Brown

However, Brown says they are making it work for such a busy county, where staff hear 300-900 cases each day on average. The new courthouse is under construction, and Brown hopes it will be open by February 2019.