For 1,200 people in California that were told to show up for jury duty this week, there was good news and bad news. The good news was they really didn’t have jury duty that day. The bad news? About 800 of those notified hoofed it all the way to the courthouse just because of a computer glitch.

Don’t get us wrong — we’d love for any jury summons to be a mistake. But it must’ve been a hassle for those who showed up at Placer County Courthouse on Tuesday, only to find out they didn’t have to be there.

CBS 13 in Sacramento says a courthouse computer system glitch triggered a traffic jam when all those people showed up to do their civil duties. Some jurists said the traffic piled up for around a quarter of a mile, and no one seemed to realize they were all going the same place.

“The alert failed to notify us yesterday afternoon, so the clerk failed to update the system,” assistant court executive officer Geoff Brandt said. “The system then goes into default mode, and we were unaware the default mode was to call in every jury panel we had scheduled for the week.”

“We apologize profusely,” Brandt added. “Our jurors are very important to us and we know it was a significant inconvenience this morning.”

Those 1,200 people will still have to show up sometime this week for jury duty, but it won’t be all at once. That would just be silly.

Computer Glitch Summons 1,200 To Auburn Courthouse [CBS 13 News]

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