COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa (AP) — The Iowa Supreme Court has issued a public reprimand for a Council Bluffs magistrate who wore his judicial robes in advertisements for his services as a private attorney. The Council Bluff Nonpareil reports that the state’s high court issued the reprimand Friday against Judicial Magistrate Clarence B. Meldrum Jr.

The Supreme Court noted that, beginning in 2009, Meldrum placed the advertisements in phone books. In his defense, Meldrum had said he never intended to imply that he “could pull any strings” for clients as a magistrate. He said he only wanted to show that he held a responsible public position.

But the high court said the ads violated the Iowa Code of Judicial Conduct.

Cass County 9-1-1 Director Rob Koppert reports cellular 9-1-1 service to the County has been restored, as of 3-p.m. today (Saturday). Some areas saw service restored by mid-day. In Shelby County, cellular 9-1-1 was restored between 1-and 2-p.m. The service had been down since about 6:30-p.m. Friday, and wireless phone users had been asked to call their local law enforcement agency instead of dialing 911. Those who called 9-1-1 using their cell phone, ended-up getting an Iowa State Patrol call center somewhere else in the state, which could have slowed response time based on unfamiliarity with the area the call was placed from.

The Des Moines Register reports the problem was blamed on a faulty piece of equipment on the Iowa Communications Network (ICN), the state-owned fiber-optic system. David Lingren, the network’s executive director, told the paper that a vendor working with the state tried to fix the problem by installing a new piece of software. That patch somehow made the problem worse, and the system failed to switch over to a backup system as it was supposed to.

Lingren’s agency worked all night on the issue, and by early Saturday afternoon, he said the network was working properly again. He said state officials would study what happened and look for ways to prevent such a problem from recurring with the 911 system. Stefanie Bond, a spokeswoman for Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Management, said she was unaware of Iowans having major difficulty gaining assistance in emergencies because of the glitch.

Officials in Cass County say the cellular 9-1-1 outage KJAN reported on Friday evening continues to disrupt service for cell customers across Iowa. Cass County 9-1-1 Director Rob Koppert notified KJAN at around 6:35-p.m Friday about the disruption of 9-1-1 service, which affects cell phone or wireless users, only. Land-line, or hard wired phone service is NOT affected. It’s not clear how the problem started, or how long it will remain in effect.

The problem occurs when someone tries to call 9-1-1 on their cell phone. When that happens, the calls are rerouted to other service areas, resulting in a delay of response from emergency crews.

If you need Emergency Service, call 9-1-1 from a land-line or wired system, or call your local law enforcement agency directly from your cell. In Cass County, that number is 712-243-2204. In Montgomery County, call 712-623-5107. In Shelby County, call 712-755-2121 if you have an emergency. In Adair County, 641-743-2148. In Audubon County, 712-563-2631. For all other counties, call your local law enforcement agency.

Again, regular landline 9-1-1 service is NOT affected by this outage.