The Sad Story of My First (Almost) Trial March 2, 2008

I met one of my first clients, let’s call him “Raul,” on the first day I was let off the leash in my department, in mid-January.

Raul was an in-custody client, accused of negligent discharge of a firearm, carrying a loaded firearm in public, and attempted animal abuse.  The client wasn’t supposed to be mine, but the assigned PD told me he couldn’t bear to handle an animal abuse case, so he passed it on to me.

Lo-and-behold, Raul wasn’t some awful man - he turned out to be one of the most genuinely-good people I’ve ever met.  Given his lack of formal employment and ties to the community, and the nature of the charges, he wasn’t released O.R.  But, Raul was unable to post even the modest bail that had been set for him.   So, for 30 days, Raul sat in jail.

About a week before trial, my suppression motion was heard - after being uneventfully arrested, the local cops decided to search my client’s home sans warrant (using the “protective sweep” justification, Maryland v. Buie, 494 U.S. 325), where they found the gun and four spent rounds.

The test for protective sweeps under Buie is whether the police have a reasonable belief, based on specific and articulable facts, that the area to be swept harbors an individual posing a danger to the police.  Amazingly, the cop didn’t lie (about anything of import) at the suppression hearing, and no such reasonable belief of danger was ever alleged.  Suppression motion granted in its entirety!

You’d think this would have slowed the DA down at least a bit, but no dice.  He proceeded full-steam ahead.  Except for the part about giving me discovery.  Despite numerous informal requests and the DA’s insistence that everything had been turned over, I received two supplemental police reports the day before trial.

The same day, I also discovered that the DA had been interviewing government witnesses without any investigator, making no record of those interviews, and refusing to disclose the statements made in the interviews.   So on the next morning, which was the day of trial, I did what any sensible defender would do - I subpoenaed the DA as a witness in his own case!

The DA flipped out and called down his supervisor, who, knowing that I was a very young PD, tried to bully me into backing down.  Alone in the hallway, she pointed her finger right in my face.

“If you don’t withdraw this subpoena,” she said, “then just so you know, we’ll be asking for sanctions.”

“Sanctions?” I asked.  “You’ll have to get in line - your deputy has broken so many discovery rules in this case that he’s going to have his witnesses excluded.  And I’ve already suppressed your gun… so let’s go in chambers and talk about sanctions.”

And that is how Raul, on the day of trial, accepted the DA’s offer of an infracted disturbing the peace charge.  It’s also how I very sadly missed out on my first trial.

brand new PD February 23, 2008

That new house with the pretty pictures… it’s gone.

I’ve moved… passed the bar… and been hired as a deputy public defender!!

I’m working in one of the general misdemeanor departments.  Monday through Friday, 8:30 - 5.  No free hours, no office days.  I have about 95 open cases at the moment, and I’ve only been around a month.

My first trial is coming up, and to make it easier, I won my suppression motion last week.  First suppression motion ever.  Suppressed the gun and the bullets!  How will the DA prove negligent discharge of a firearm when he can’t prove that the gun was loaded with live rounds?

Sherri Jefferson strikes back May 17, 2007

Sherri Jefferson, the former Georgia public defender who was held in contempt and sentenced for 30 days, has struck back and filed slander actions against both Mike Mears, Director of the Georgia Public Defense Standards Council, and Albert Murray, the Commissioner for the Department of Juvenile Justice.

In her Notices of Intent to Sue, Jefferson alleges that Mears and Murray conspired to slander her in an effort to prevent her from speaking out on the “abusive practices” of the Department of Juvenile Justice, which apparently include the illegal detention of several children for in excess of four weeks, and refusing in that time to ever let them see an attorney.

Sometimes you see it coming… April 24, 2007

Sadly, I won’t be working as a post-bar at a particular next-county-over Public Defender’s office - that office seems to have bigger problems to worry about.  So, let’s see - you’re the head of a county’s indigent defense system that is understaffed, plagued with “unbearable caseloads” (ineffective assistance?) and accusations of managerial “incompetence”, causing you to lose veteran DPDs on a regular basis.

The solution: eliminate your post-bar program altogether. After four months of waiting for a definite answer from them, this Public Defender has decided that they’d be better off without summer post-bar interns… apparently nobody from that office read my post about public defender recruitment!

Sherri Jefferson (30 days for “contempt”) April 16, 2007

Many of you have been following the story of Sherri Jefferson, the GA public defender who was given 30 days for contempt of court. Ms. Jefferson submitted a 17-page letter of resignation shortly before a Georgia appellate court upheld the contempt punishment. Although I haven’t been able to get the actual letter yet, today I received 33 pages of various documents that were attached to that letter of resignation, including:

• Her affidavit in support of a motion to recuse the original judge (George Rountree) and opposition to contempt allegations;
• The affidavit of Circuit Defender Grayson P. Lane (apparently an alleged co-contemnor) in support of a motion to recuse Judge Rountree;
• A letter from Grayson P. Lane to the judge regarding the judge’s complaints about Ms. Jefferson.

These supporting documents paint a troubling picture of the Glynn County Juvenile Court, detailing the court’s consistent failure to provide timely opportunity for determining whether arrestees are eligible for appointed defense counsel; draconian treatment of detained children; and, a great deal of disrespect from both Judge Rountree and Assistant District Attorney Frank Aspinwall being directed toward attorneys from the Circuit Defender in general and Ms. Jefferson in specific.

More details are forthcoming.

Recruitment April 12, 2007

Just like the military, large legal firms may have high turnover rates and unhappy associates, but one thing they do well is recruitment. They know the types of students they want to recruit and they make an effort to go out and get them. Sadly, this is something that public defense agencies are failing at miserably..

Given the well-deserved reputation for low salary and wholly undeserved reputation for being the last bastion of inept attorneys, public defender offices are already at a disadvantage when it comes to recruitment of law students. Nevertheless, there are still three student demographics that public defense offices appeal to: “true believers,” students looking for quick trial experience, and students who just want to be involved in criminal law in some capacity.

Public defender recruitment should have three steps:

1. Attract the attention of those students with an interest in public defense (see above categories);
2. Narrow the recruitment pool down to those students fitting into the “true believer” category;
3. Apply aptitude and attitude rankings and select candidates from there.

PD offices stumble through the first two steps, and by the time they get to the third, it hardly matters. They’ve already lost many of their best candidates. Current public defender recruitment practices are detrimental all around: would-be public defenders find (or fail to find) work elsewhere; the agencies themselves suffer high turnover rates; and defendants don’t get attorneys as good as the ones they might have received, had the agency recruited effectively.

So, how can PD offices efficiently attract the attention of the appropriate students?

First: Contact each law school’s career services department, provide your office’s information, keep them informed of new job opportunities for both attorneys and interns. This one is a no-brainer.

Second: If there is not already a criminal clinic through each law school, collaborate with the school to build such a program.

Third: Get in touch with each appropriate student group: many schools have chapters of the National Lawyers Guild, the American Association for Justice (formerly ATLA), the American Constitution Society, and similar organizations. Many of your deputy public defenders may be members of these organizations - use this to your advantage by cajoling them into acting as liaisons. Once you’re in touch with these groups, you will want to meet and speak with the student membership - but take it a step further, and actively engage these groups with programming: arrange speaking engagements, happy hours, screenings of films like The Thin Blue Line.

What’s so important about weeding out everyone but the “true believers”?

This part is a matter of using your resources efficiently. Whether you’re hiring attorneys or student interns, your office will (hopefully) be expending a considerable amount of time and money to train them. Do you want to allocate those resources to someone who is planning to take advantage of your office’s training only to leave you in three years for private practice? Or worse, someone who will wind up becoming a DA because they “just want to do criminal law,” and not necessarily defense?

If you’re situated in a major metropolitan area (and I must admit, this blog assumes as much), you should have enough law students to provide you with a sizable potential intern pool - once you select your interns, it is crucial that you establish a mentorship program. Once it’s in place, it really won’t require that much effort from your deputies, but it will aid your recruiting in two distinct ways.

First: It will build personal and emotional connections between your office and each student - few things will make students more interested in working for you.

Second: Your deputy mentors act as individual human resource managers and, in the course of the mentorship, seek to determine whether each student is the type likely to be a good investment for your office. Law students are savvy - they know the “correct” answer to interview questions - so don’t let them fool you. After mentoring them for a semester or longer, your deputies will be in an excellent position to report to you on the true nature of the student they mentored.