Judge lashes out on state defender system

By Bill Rankin

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A judge has approved a new plan to improve indigent defense in North Georgia, saying the state's system badly needs to be fixed.

"The Georgia indigent defense system is broken," Superior Court Judge J. David Roper wrote in an decision signed Wednesday. "It is a mega-bureaucracy adrift with no rudder. No business, nonprofit organization or government agency could survive under the present scheme."

Roper signed a consent order in a North Georgia case that lays out plans to provide better representation to poor people accused of crimes in the rural, five-county Northern Judicial Circuit.

Among other things, it calls for the state public defender agency to provide counsel in the Northern circuit within 24 hours after a defendant is found to be indigent. It also sets case load limits for lawyers and monitoring of their performance.

A lawsuit, one of a number slapped on the state public defender agency, was filed last year on behalf of Northern circuit defendants. It said funding problems that have plagued the agency for years had eroded its ability to provide prompt representation for the poor.

In fiscal year 2010, for example, the state collected $44.6 million in fees and surcharges through a system set up by the General Assembly to fund the state defender system. But the Legislature appropriated $37.4 million to the Georgia Public Defender Standards Council in FY 2010, more than $7 million less than the collections.

In 2008, defendants sat in jail for prolonged periods because there were no lawyers to represent them at bond hearings, according to testimony at a hearing in March. Sometimes indigent defendants appeared at their criminal arraignments without representation, almost shutting down criminal prosecutions.

The order addresses the primary problems in the Northern circuit, Gerry Weber, a lawyer with the Southern Center for Human Rights, said Friday, adding that he hoped it becomes a model for other problem circuits. 

"It requires counsel to be swiftly appointed and for lawyers to be on task and not to be over committed. We appreciate the state working with us on a resolution of this case and expect them to honor it."

Roper said state funding isn't the agency's only problem. He expressed frustration that circuit public defenders, who oversee local indigent defense offices, "are supervised and answer to no one. ... There is no requirement or incentive for efficiency of excellence."

Mack Crawford, director of the defender agency, said the terms of the agreement are acceptable and also said he agreed with Roper's findings. "If this system's going to survive, it's going to have to change," he said.