At Least You Got What You Needed Mr. Connected Lawyer!

There's another rant over at The Connected Lawyer about antiquated court filing systems in various Illinois counties. I feel his pain and have written about the issue in this space previously. This was my experience this morning...

So I've been appointed by the court to represent a Respondent in some post-decree (post-divorce) litigation. I got appointed in March and the procedure is that when I'm appointed the judge's clerk faxes me a copy of the order appointing me. But beyond that it's up to me to meet with my now client and sort of figure out the case status. Part of that review usually means a trip to room 802 at Daley to review my client's case file. Fine...I'd rather be doing this on the Internet in my home office but that's for a past and likely future post. Here's the critical problem: I was appointed on March 24th and another substantive order was entered that day. The substantive order that was entered on March 24th is NOT IN THE COURT'S FILE; today is May 7th. What is that some 53 days? I ask the court's clerk and she gave me some explanation about "it's on its way to the warehouse" and it would take an hour to look into it (not necessarily find it). And this case is in court on May 9th. Now it's beyond a hassle to becoming a real detriment towards my ability to competently represent a client.