Defendants on the lower end of the socio-economic scale find themselves at the mercy of public defenders who are swamped with cases, understaffed, and underfunded. Research shows that even before mass incarceration accelerated in the 1980s, overburdened systems of indigent defense struggled to meet the 6th Amendment constitutional mandate. Public defenders usually have the deck stacked against them due to discovery laws favoring prosecutors and lack of sufficient resources.
"Court Watch NOLA revealed in May that all calls made from prisoners in the jail in Orleans Parish to their attorneys' cell phones are recorded. These recordings have then been turned over to District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro's office, which has used these conversations as evidence in prosecutions."
New Orleans Times-Picayune
June 23, 2018
Read More"What it’s like to be a federal public defender on the Texas border right now."
Slate
June 20, 2018
Read More"The Georgia Supreme Court ruled in two separate cases Monday that it’s unconstitutional for the government to detain defendants declared mentally incompetent to stand trial while evaluating whether they can be restored to competency."
Atlanta Daily Report
June 19, 2018
Read More"People placed on a waiting list are denied their Sixth Amendment right to counsel for an unspecified amount of time. As such, they are forced to languish in pretrial detention or otherwise have their representation unreasonably delayed, often leading them to plead guilty prematurely — even if they are innocent — just so that they can get out of jail and return to their families and whatever may be left of their jobs or careers."
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
June 18, 2018
Read More“I know the community isn’t necessarily concerned about our plight,” DeWeese said. “But for the sake of functionality of the court, you’d think judges and the prosecutors office would be concerned.”
West Hawaii Today
June 18, 2018
Read More"A lot of the people who are prosecuted in Berkshire County are not hardcore criminals; they're sinners. They're people who screwed up. They had a bad day and now they have to pay for it. And I agree with that."
The Berkshire Eagle
June 11, 2018
Read More"The hardships of the public defender's office are not new. Public defender offices are regularly spilling over with cases. Staff turnover is around 25 percent and the officials hope to address an issue of representing clients who don't actually qualify for court-appointed representation. Add to the list the Office of Public Defender's operational expenses: approximately $74.5 million, or in other words, $9.5 million more than its funding from the state from the last regular session."
Great Falls Tribune
June 11, 2018
Read More"The right to legal counsel has long been the gold standard of American justice under the Constitution. But what happens when a state refuses to budget for public defenders? Louisiana is finding out."
The Atlantic
June 2, 2018
Read More"Public defenders are trying to transform the justice system wholesale. For starters, they’re focusing on diversion for those arrested and treating incarceration as an option of last resort."
The Appeal
June 1, 2018
Read More"Attorneys with the Office of the Clark County Public Defender say the county’s district attorney’s office frequently violates the law that governs the sharing of information, also known as 'discovery'."
The Appeal
May 23, 2018
Read More"The New Mexico Public Defender Commission gathered testimony Monday from local public defenders, national judicial experts and prosecutors as it considers how much work public defenders can shoulder before turning away indigent defendants who face jail time."
U.S. News & World Report
May 21, 2018
Read More"I don’t think you succeed in limiting jail population without addressing public defenders. If you want to get folks to jail fast, just don’t resource their defenders."
The Advocate
April 28, 2018
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