Public Defense: The New Gay Marriage

The public defense world in Georgia is cracking, crumbling and falling apart. Some may say it's already fallen. It started with the legislature cutting our budget in half mid-year. It continued with bad decisions at the state-wide management level. The office that handles conflict cases for Metro Atlanta (Fulton and Dekalb counties) was shut down with two weeks notice for the employees. Their 1,800 client will be unceremoniously dumped by management onto the plates of various PDs in the area. PDs that already represent the co-defendants in most of those cases. There is a lawsuit to keep it open, filed by members of the criminal defense community who care about the constitution.

There are op-ed pieces by state reps who say that spending less than $1000 to defend a person charged with a felony is A-OK with them. If you are poor and charged with a crime in America, you'd better hope you are anywhere other than Georgia. The op-ed pieces remind me of the Gay Marriage issue from the last election. It's uncanny really. I don't know which is worse: The politicians with dirty motives or the easily swayed, ignorant public who can't recognize bullshit rhetoric that's being flung into their eyes.

How is public defense "the new gay marriage?"

States in the US are still separate entities, no matter how strong the federal government becomes. States are still able to recognize their own laws and policies and determine which laws and policies from other states they will recognize as well. For example: A concealed weapon permit is valid in the state that issued the permit, and some other states will recognize your right to carry a weapon with that other state's permit. BUT, some states do not recognize that right, and if you're carrying you can get arrested despite your permit. If another state's law is against the public policy of your state, your state is not required to recognize that state's law. So, if your state does not recognize same-sex marriage, there's no requirement that you recognize a same-sex marriage from another state. A same-sex couple can't get married in New York and come to Georgia and expect the same rights. They can't get medical benefits, they don't have automatic inheritance rights, they can't come here and get divorces either.

Despite this established policy, in the last election same-sex marriage was a big issue in Georgia. Lots of politicians "came out" (ha ha, I'm clever) in support of a constitutional amendment against same-sex unions. Was there a chance that Georgia would soon change it's laws? Was Georgia the next in line after Vermont and Massachusetts to make it into the 21st fucking century? No. Not even close. There was no way this should have been an issue. Despite the complete uselessness of a constitutional amendment, state reps jumped at the opportunity to get support on this highly emotional issue. They had found a way to motivate conservatives to get out and vote.

Today, Brian Nichols has a public defender, or three. He is accused of killing a judge, a deputy, a Federal Agent in 2005. The State is trying to execute him. His defense bill has been called into question and has been reported at, ballpark: $1.5 million. They have several prosecutors working on this case full time. Several of the prosecutors make, ballpark: $150,000 in salary. There are also State investigators, paralegals, etc. The state plans to call almost 500 witnesses. There is a lot of news coverage here about the case and mostly about his defense bills. The local coverage has lasted long after the national media stopped covering highlights (never the local budget battles). At first there was a lot of national news. Brian Nichols was all over CNN and the like, the manhunt was especially good for generating ad revenue. His girlfriend and meth partner was on Oprah making money selling her story. Everyone here knows Brian Nichols. Everyone knows his lawyers have been paid by the state, although nobody talks about the cost of the prosecution, only the defense.

For a lot of people it is a "hot topic" and an emotional issue to see Brian Nichols being represented by public defenders. Some people are mad that their tax dollars are being spent to give him a defense. Now is the perfect time to make public defense the target of popular hatred. State reps have seized this idea and succeeded in making headlines by cutting the state-wide budget in half. This got them in the news. This got the debate started. This will get people out to vote.

I think the State has done its best to stop citizens from receiving effective representation and to stop them from having constitutional rights. We'll see something on the ballot that will give people the idea that they're helping to fight "the war on crime." It may be as simple as a budget allocation issue, or something as big as the disolution of the state-wide public defender system. If that happens, it won't just be people accused of crimes that each face a life crisis, it'll be a whole lot of their lawyers too.