Hawaiʻi's online court services experienced an interruption Thursday morning, while Honolulu District Court at Kauikeaouli Hale closed because of a power outage.
What Happened
An Oct. 9 notice carried by einnews.com stated that “the Hawaiʻi State Judiciary's Electronic Filing System (JEFS) is currently not available.” The notice said that “the underlying electrical problem that caused the outage has been addressed” and that full access to JEFS was expected to resume soon. It also stated: “Courthouses statewide are open.”
Separately, the Hawaiʻi State Judiciary confirmed in an official notice that some of its systems and services were interrupted on Thursday, Oct. 29, and directed anyone seeking updates to check the Judiciary's own website. Online Judiciary services were to remain down until further notice.
A Pattern of Courthouse Disruptions This Year
Thursday's outage is not the first time Hawaiʻi's court system has had to manage an unplanned technical or infrastructure failure in 2026. Back in May, a power outage forced the closure of Kaʻahumanu Hale, the Circuit Court of the First Circuit at 777 Punchbowl Street in Honolulu, at 2 p.m., with officials noting that all hearings and trials scheduled for that afternoon would need to be rescheduled. In that instance, then-Chief Justice Vladimir P. Devens issued an order extending the deadline for documents due that day to the following Wednesday.
In September, Honolulu District Court at Kauikeaouli Hale closed for a different reason entirely: a loss of water and air conditioning inside the building, as reported by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. During that closure, courtroom 7C hearings for defendants in custody were shifted to Kaneohe District Court on Pookela Street rather than being delayed outright. The Judiciary has also run scheduled maintenance outages before, including over Memorial Day weekend, when JEFS, eCourt Kōkua, eTraffic and eJury, along with phone-based eTraffic and jury services, were all taken offline at once for planned work.
How Past Outages Were Resolved
Past incidents have included canceled hearings being rescheduled and filing deadlines being extended. In 2020, a power outage closed the Honolulu District Court building and then-Chief Justice Mark E. Recktenwald said hearings canceled because of the closure would be rescheduled, according to Hawaii News Now.
As first reported by Kauaʻi Now, Thursday's interruption hit online Judiciary systems unexpectedly in the morning. Online services were to remain down until further notice, and the Judiciary directed users to its website for updates.
