ATLANTA — More than 1,000 court notices were returned to the Fulton County Courthouse because of the ongoing mail delays.
Some families never got eviction notices and others missed their court dates.
During a news conference Tuesday, the Fulton County clerk had the boxes of mail stacked on the court steps.
Channel 2′s Tyisha Fernandes learned that it’s not just civil cases in magistrate court.
There was a bond hearing in superior court Tuesday morning that did not happen because the attorney said he never got any notice in the mail.
“Within a three day span, we received 1,100 plus pieces of mail that just said return to sender,” Fulton County Clerk Che Alexander said.
Alexander said she was surprised when all of the mail came back to the courthouse.
She stood on the steps of the courthouse Tuesday and explained how the U.S. Postal Service’s ongoing mail delays have affected Fulton County residents who have business with Magistrate or Superior Court.
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Some of the returned mail was from 2021, but most of it was dated after the Palmetto distribution center was opened in February and failed from Day 1 because of bad management.
“When we get something ‘returned to sender’ we’re supposed to put it on the docket. Well, they didn’t have proper information because we didn’t know the notices were not delivered,” Alexander said.
The damage has already been done for families that ended up getting evicted, or people who got locked up for failing to show up for court.
Alexander said that only adds to jail overcrowding.
“The only thing we can do moving forward is let the judges know they weren’t properly noticed,” Alexander said.
Alexander called Sen. Jon Ossoff for help because he’s been putting what he calls “maximum pressure” on Postmaster General Louis DeJoy.
“I am asking the Inspector General to vigorously and rapidly investigate this to bring answers to me and to bring answers to impact Georgians about how this could have happened,” Ossoff said.
We’re working to get the names of the 1,100 people affected and we know the number is probably even higher.
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