Louisville man with coronavirus ordered to isolate himself or risk arrest and charges

A Jefferson County man has been ordered into self-isolation against his will after he was diagnosed with COVID-19 and wouldn't isolate himself.

William Nooning, 66, who lives in the South End, was diagnosed with coronavirus at a hospital and refused to comply, according to an order signed Saturday and revised Sunday by Jefferson Circuit Court Chief Judge Angela McCormick Bisig.

Nooning has been ordered to stay in his Southside Drive home for 14 days.

Bisig ordered the Jefferson County sheriff’s department to serve the order and for Metro Corrections to fit him with a global positioning device. The order says he will be constantly monitored to ensure he remains at home.

Any violations may result in his arrest and criminal charges. The revised order allowed him to be quarantined at home.

Nooning could not be immediately reached for comment by The Courier Journal on Sunday.

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The order, requested by the Louisville Metro Department of Health and Wellness, said that after Nooning was found to be infected, he failed to comply with self-isolation “as evidenced by going shopping yesterday, March 21.”

The Health Department said it repeatedly attempted to contact him at the number he gave to the hospital that tested him.

The order was issued based on the testimony of a Health Department employee identified in the order as Matt Rhodes.

The order was requested by Jefferson County Attorney Mike O'Connell's office on behalf of the health department, which it represents.

Jean Porter, a spokeswoman for Mayor Greg Fischer, supported the health department's decision to request the order.

"We will take any and all steps we can legally take to protect the public, including a quarantine order when appropriate and necessary," she said.

Nooning is at least the second person in Kentucky who has been ordered to stay at home.

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In Nelson County, another man was ordered on March 14 to stay home and placed under 24-hour-a-day guard by a deputy sheriff.

Local, state and federal laws allow involuntarily quarantines to protect the spread of infectious diseases.

There are no known preventive medications for this disease at this time, according to the order, which says the most effective method currently known to medical science to contain and curtail the spread of this disease is the isolation of anyone who has the symptoms and the quarantine of those who have been exposed to a person infected with this disease.