A power outage led to the closure of the Edmonton law courts on Wednesday.
A spokesperson for the Alberta Court of Appeal said, “The Edmonton law courts building has limited power and lighting and access is very limited.”
According to Alberta Infrastructure, power to the Court of King’s Bench and Court of Appeal in Edmonton was interrupted at 2:45 p.m. on Tuesday. That lead to “system failures” in sections of the building. After that, critical systems continued to operate with emergency generator power.
“Since then, power has returned to most critical systems, but all non-emergency lighting remains without power,” the Alberta Infrastructure spokesperson told Global News.
“Currently, the cause is still being investigated but critical systems are back to using power from the local grid. Once the cause is identified, a timeline for the restoration of all powered services in the building can be developed.”
The south tower of the courts will remain closed on Thursday.
Any urgent matters and emergency protection order reviews set for Jan. 5 will be dealt with by a King’s Bench Justice sitting at the north (provincial court) tower, in courtroom 357. For details on how all other scheduled matters will be dealt with, click here.
The outage meant all hearings scheduled for Wednesday were adjourned, including the highly-anticipated appeal hearing of convicted killer Bradley Barton, who was sentenced in July 2021 to 12 and a half years in prison for the death of Cindy Gladue.
A jury found Barton guilty of manslaughter in the death of Gladue, 36, a Métis and Cree woman.
She was killed in a hotel room at the Yellowhead Inn in June 2011.
In August of 2021, the former long-haul trucker from Ontario appealed his conviction and sentence.