The Maine Supreme Judicial Court reinstated a suit seeking to recover personal property after it was dismissed for the plaintiffs nonappearance in district court, concluding that the sanction was too drastic given the misunderstandings about pandemic remote hearing orders in June 2023.
In a May 23 opinion, authored by Justice Wayne R. Douglas, the court concluded that while the district court didn’t err in dismissing the lawsuit over Tammy and James Rutledge’s nonappearance, as they believed they were to appear by telephone, the dismissal was too drastic given the circumstances.
