The Louisiana Supreme Court building was flooded and many critical files and evidence boxes are presumably destroyed. City and district court buildings in neighboring parishes have been similarly hit.

Lawyers and judges alike are scrambling to answer previously unimaginable questions: What will happen to pending cases? What about the out-on-bail defendants, witnesses and even law-enforcement officials who are among the several hundred thousand evacuees sprinkled throughout the country, many in Texas?

Judge Patrick Higginbotham said his formerly New Orleans-based 5th Circuit Court of Appeals will be back in business in Houston by next week.

But Katrina's devastating aftermath will be ''enormously disruptive'' for the Gulf Coast region's state and local courts, he said.

''I don't think the tasks we face are nearly as difficult as those in the state courts in the Gulf Coast region,'' the Austin, Texas-based Higginbotham said.

Louisiana State University law professor John Baker said the disruption is a ''lesson about what many of us take for granted, of what it takes to function every day, of what it takes to keep a society together.''

Baker had just returned from a class now brimming with displaced students from New Orleans-based Tulane and Loyola universities. Everyone, he said, left the room shaking their heads.

''It's not just the evidence, it's the witnesses,'' he said. ''Where are the witnesses? Where are the defendants? How are you going to catch them?''

The day after Katrina hit, the Louisiana Supreme Court issued an emergency order, freezing deadlines and court proceedings through at least Sept. 9. On Tuesday, Gov. Kathleen Blanco, in response to requests from the state bar and other lawyers groups, suspended all court proceedings statewide though Sept. 25.

''The destruction and disruption of services and infrastructure to our system of justice caused by Hurricane Katrina will have a profound impact on the basic rights to an untold number of persons unless action is taken,'' the governor's order stated.

Federal courts for the entire Southeastern region of the state issued a similar order, with no set date for reopening.

''The entire federal infrastructure has been displaced throughout the region,'' said one federal law enforcement supervisor, who agreed to speak on condition of anonymity. ''The courts have closed down.''

The FBI office in New Orleans had wind and water damage that soaked case files and other key records.

Another daunting issue is trying to track people still being monitored by the criminal justice system who have been dislocated by the storm.

''Where are the bad guys?'' said the federal law enforcement supervisor. ''And out of these millions of evacuees, I'm sure there are a number of them who are on parole, probation or are sex offenders who are now in the great state of Texas. What do you do about that?''